Barbara Glesner Fines honored with 2026 family law award

For her inspirational work in family law, Barbara Glesner Fines will receive the Roger P. Krumm Family Law Award at The Missouri Bar’s Family Law Conference in Branson this week.

Presented by The Missouri Bar Family Law Committee, the Roger P. Krumm Family Law Award honors a family law lawyer who has demonstrated an exceptional degree of competence, skill, integrity, commitment, and dedication toward the improvement and advancement of the practice of family law and the parties involved in family law matters.

Glesner Fines is the Rubey M. Hulen professor of law and dean emerita of the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin at Madison School of Law and Yale Law School, she has taught various law courses and co-founded the law school’s family law emphasis program, which includes multiple clinics and international and interdisciplinary coursework. 

“I have the awesome privilege of teaching students and attorneys how to do that work professionally, compassionately, and effectively,” Glesner Fines said.

Glesner Fines founded and directs the UMKC Self Help Clinic in a partnership with Legal Aid of Western Missouri, supervising students and helping as a volunteer lawyer counseling clients in family law matters and other civil issues.

She was the reporter on the revision of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers “Bounds of Advocacy,” the ethical standards for the organization’s fellows. She also wrote numerous articles and is a frequent presenter at conferences on ethics and family law topics.   

She was the chair of the American Association of Law Schools Section on Professional Responsibility, is a member of the executive committee of the AALS Section on Family Law, is a member of the American Bar Association Center for Professional Responsibility, and is on the editorial board of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts’ Family Court Review.

Glesner Fines said she is “incredibly honored” to receive this year’s Roger P. Krumm Family Law Award. She emphasized that family law is fundamental to the legal profession and society.

“Families are the foundation of society, and family law attorneys have impact far beyond their client's cases,” she said. “… Family matters are often an individual's first exposure to the law, lawyers, and the courts. If I have done my job well, the attorneys I have taught become professionals who enhance the public's trust in the rule of law.”

Click here to learn more about annual awards presented by The Missouri Bar, the Missouri Bar Foundation, and other entities. Read about other 2026 award winners here.