Joel Heller

Assistant Professor of Law

Professor Joel Heller joined the College of Law in 2026, where he teaches labor law, employment law, and constitutional law.

Professor Heller’s research examines the connections between work and democracy, including the ways in which labor law advances and is shaped by democratic norms from the political sphere, but also how analogies to the political model when setting labor policy can undermine its promise.  His work has appeared in the Vanderbilt Law Review, Illinois Law Review, California Law Review Online, Memphis Law Review, and Hofstra Law Review, and he also has contributed to  OnLabor.  Before joining the UK Law faculty, Professor Heller worked at the National Labor Relations Board’s Appellate and Supreme Court Litigation Branch, where he briefed and argued over forty-five cases in eleven federal courts of appeals and participated in cert- and merits-stage proceedings at the Supreme Court.  Earlier, he clerked for the Honorable Karen Nelson Moore on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.

Professor Heller holds a law degree from Vanderbilt University Law School and an English degree from Oberlin College.