Shelly Page | SIU

Cheryl “Shelly” Taylor Page is an Associate Professor of Law at Southern Illinois University School of Law, where she is a tenured faculty member. From 2022–2025, she served as Director of Experiential Learning, Director of Clinical Experience, Director of the Pro Bono Program, and Director of the JD/MD program (SIU Law/SIU School of Medicine), as well as the law school’s faculty representative. A member of the Illinois Statewide Task Force on Human Trafficking and the Illinois Pioneer Coalition Board, she is licensed to practice law in Texas and has been an attorney since 1993 and a law professor since 2004.

Professor Page teaches Criminal Procedure, Trial Advocacy, Evidence, Criminal Law, Human Trafficking, Domestic Violence Law, Civil Rights, Human Rights, and related experiential and skills courses. Her teaching and scholarship center on human trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation, domestic violence, civil and human rights, and the ways law schools can better prepare “practice-ready” graduates. She recently completed her Ed.D. at Southern Illinois University, focusing on experiential learning and legal education.

Before joining SIU, Professor Page taught at St. Mary’s University School of Law in San Antonio, Texas; Lincoln Memorial University Duncan School of Law in Knoxville, Tennessee (where she earned tenure and chaired multiple committees); and Florida A&M University College of Law in Orlando, Florida. Earlier in her career, she worked as a staff attorney for Gulf Coast Legal Foundation in Galveston/Houston, as a criminal prosecutor in Travis County (Austin), and as a staff attorney for the Texas State Board for Educator Certification.

Professor Page is co-author of Human Trafficking (Carolina Academic Press, 1st ed. 2016; 2nd ed. 2022) and has written numerous law review articles and essays on trafficking, wrongful convictions, childhood obesity, education law, environmental racism, and voting rights. She is an Expert Witness on Human Trafficking for the American Bar Association’s Center for Human Rights and has spoken nationally and internationally on human exploitation, trauma-informed lawyering, and access to justice, including in Austria, South Africa, China, Turkey, the Czech Republic, England, and across the United States.

A frequent commentator for television, radio, and podcasts, Professor Page has appeared on outlets such as Lifetime TV, the Black News Channel, Spectrum News, NPR/WSIU, and multiple legal and community programs to discuss human trafficking, domestic violence, race, and contemporary constitutional issues. She also teaches courtroom testimony and trauma-informed practice to law enforcement officers through the University of Tennessee’s Law Enforcement Innovation Center and National Forensic Academy.