Chancellor Emeritus John Costonis, a native of Boston, Massachusetts, attended area public schools, Harvard University (A.B.) and Columbia Law School (L.L.B.). After service as a United States Army Counter-Intelligence officer, he attended the Universities of Pavia and Rome, Italy for graduate studies in philosophy. Chancellor Costonis has clerked or practiced with the Washington, D.C. law firm of Covington & Burling and the Chicago, Ill. law firm of Ross & Hardies. He has taught as a regular or visiting faculty member at the law schools of the University of Pennsylvania, Illinois, Berkeley and New York University, and served, successively, as the Vanderbilt Law School dean and the LSU Law Center chancellor (1998-June 2007). His practice, teaching, scholarship, and consulting have focused on environmental, property, land use, and historic preservation issues. He is a member of the Advisory Commission to the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority.