University Mourns the Passing of Distinguished Law Lecturer

The University is saddened to announce the passing of Rhonda Gay Hartman, distinguished lecturer of law, April 7.

Hartman joined the School of Law faculty as an adjunct professor in 1994, teaching courses related to law and medical ethics, health care and children’s issues. She helped to develop the school’s concentration in health care ethics and served as its adviser while also working with the University’s Center for Health Care Ethics.

“Professor Hartman was a treasured member of our law school family,” said President and former School of Law Dean Ken Gormley, who taught Hartman at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. “She exuded professionalism, grace and warmth in our halls and in her service to the community.”

In 2015, she became a visiting professor, adding a course in torts, and became a full-time faculty member in 2018, creating the law school’s professionalism program for first-year students. She was named a distinguished lecturer in 2020.

“I recruited her to come to Duquesne when I started teaching at the law school,” Gormley said in the Post-Gazette obituary for Hartman. “We were trying to build a law and medicine niche, and obviously she had a lot of experience and talent in that area. She loved teaching, and to her, that was the most important thing you could do in life. There was no kinder person, no one who cared more about her students, than Rhonda Gay Hartman.”

At Duquesne, Hartman created and directed a mentorship program for first-year law students. The initiative introduced law students to professional behavior in various settings and instilled etiquette and integrity as they prepared to become lawyers.

Hartman published extensively in her specialties, and she was a peer reviewer for the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) and JAMA Pediatrics. She was invited to present her work at various conferences, universities and institutions. Hartman’s work focused on legal and policy issues in innovative surgical procedures and on the rights of children and adolescents in health care, including the intersection of medical ethics and the law.

In addition, Hartman worked with state and federal lawmakers in drafting legislation. She also served as a consultant to the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions and to Sen. Edward M. Kennedy to foster national policy for promotion of youth development through the Younger Americans Act. Hartman co-chaired and wrote the report for the Subcommittee on Medical Ethics of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s Task Force for Pediatric Palliative and Hospice Care.

Hartman also served as president of the Pittsburgh Symphony Association and was a member of the symphony’s board of directors. She was a board member for the Twentieth Century Club and the Ladies Hospital Aid Society.