Rory Dean Smith
Rory Dean Smith is the Founding Managing Director and CEO of Remsbridge, Inc., a boutique consultancy that provides services in strategic planning, diversity and inclusion policies and practices, training, and executive coaching.
Mr. Smith is the principal author and creator of “The Pathway to Reconciliation” workshop series and aligned curriculum which is an antiracism and diversity training workshop. The Pathway of Reconciliation is designed for the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago with participation from all of the 128 congregations. Mr. Smith also authored and conducted a ‘train the trainer’ curriculum for dozens of facilitators of the Pathway to Reconciliation program.
Mr. Smith has served as The Director of Diversity Affairs and Outreach as well as The Associate Dean for Outreach and Planning and at The John Marshall Law School. Mr. Smith was responsible for all diversity and inclusion strategy which included the diversity of student, faculty and staff recruitment, retention, training, and programming. He created programs of recruitment and retention targeted to traditionally under-represented students and developed a series of outreach programs, including the National Undergraduate Diversity Mock Trial Competition. He was a co-founder of the Chicago Consortium of Law School Diversity Professions; Co-Chair of the Anti-Racism Commission of the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago; and a founding board member of the Legal Prep Charter Academies. He also served as a member of the American Bar Association’s Council on Racial and Ethnic Diversity in the Educational Pipeline.
Mr. Smith has advised on institutional policies, procedures, and operations to help create more equitable outcomes within workplaces. In addition, Mr. Smith has also been responsible for institutional research, disability accommodations, academic support programs, and institutional advancement, including fundraising, alumni, event management and publications. Mr. Smith also taught law school courses entitled: “Mass Incarceration and Race in the United States”. Mr. Smith has made numerous presentations and facilitations for discussion of diversity, dismantling institutional racism and racial reconciliation.
Mr. Smith serves as a member of the Standing Committee of the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago and is a former co-chair and current member of the Anti-Racism Commission of the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago. Mr. Smith has been a member of the board of Gift of Hope Organ & Tissue Donor Network, and president of the Homewood Flossmoor Fine and Performing Arts Council. Mr. Smith also has served as assistant chancellor to the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago, president of the Chicago Mortgage Attorneys Association, chairman of the Cabrini Green Legal Aid Clinic, and president of the Minority Legal Education Resources, Inc., boards of directors. His previous board work also includes serving as vice president of the St. Augustine College Board of Trustees and vice president of the Flossmoor School District 161 Board of Education.
Mr. Smith obtained a JD from Northwestern University and a MBA from Northwestern University’s J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management and a BA from Northwestern University.
View his personal website here.