1985-1986

Harriet Newman Cohen graduated from Barnard College (BA Latin, with Music minor, 1952) and Bryn Mawr (MA Latin, 1953). After teaching mathematics while raising four daughters, she graduated from Brooklyn Law School (1974), where she was an editor of the Law Review. A matrimonial lawyer, she has been a champion of divorce reform and the rights of women and children. She helped negotiate and draft the NYS Equitable Distribution Law in 1980, and she cowrote an analysis of the first 80 cases under that law. Gov. Mario M. Cuomo appointed her to his Child Support Commission, which drafted the law that became the Child Support Standards Act in 1989. She is the author of The Divorce Book for Men and Women, A Step-by-Step Guide to Gaining Your Freedom Without Losing Everything Else. She has been voted a Super Lawyer in family law, writes an annual article on family law for the NY Law Journal, and has been designated as Super Lawyer and one of the Top 50 women attorneys and Top 100 attorneys in New York for many years. She remains in active practice in her firm, Cohen Rabin Stine Schumann LLP. In 2020, she was honored as Brooklyn Law School’s “Alumna of the Year.” She is  President of the Class of 1952 at Barnard and on the Board of Directors of the Lotos Club of New York City and the Stecher & Horowitz Foundation, which runs a biennial competition for gifted young pianists from around the world.