Melissa Serfass

Professor of Law Librarianship;
Electronic Resources & Reference Librarian

(501) 916-5459 | Room 132
Email: [email protected]

Curriculum Vitae

Melissa Serfass joined the UA Little Rock William H. Bowen School of Law faculty in 1992. She served as Interim Associate Dean for Information Services and Law Library Director from 2025 to 2026, and returns to the faculty as Professor of Law Librarianship. She teaches Advanced Legal Research and has also taught Specialized Legal Research courses in business law and family law. Her research and teaching interests include legal research methodology, the integration of artificial intelligence tools into legal research practice, and animal law.

Professor Serfass has written extensively on legal research topics, including two legal research guides on animal welfare law co-authored with Professor Stefanie Pearlman. The most recent, Animal Welfare Laws: A Legal Research Guide (William S. Hein & Co., 2023), received the Government Law Libraries Special Interest Section’s Dr. Joel Fishman Professional Publication Award from the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL). She also co-authored, with Professor Jessie Wallace Burchfield, Arkansas Practice Materials: A Selective Annotated Bibliography, now in its second edition and kept current through periodic supplementation. Her other publications address court rules on opinion publication and citation, Arkansas legislative history research, and library marketing and technology.

Professor Serfass is active in AALL and its regional and state affiliates, having served as an officer or committee chair in several of its sections, including the Research Instruction & Patron Services Special Interest Section (RIPS), the Computing Services Special Interest Section, and the Animal Law Caucus. She served for many years as research editor of the Journal of Appellate Practice and Process, and has also served as newsletter editor for RIPS and for the Mid-America Association of Law Libraries, and as associate editor of the Animal Law Committee Newsletter of the ABA Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Section. She received the AALL ALL-SIS Outstanding Article of the Year Award and the RIPS Star Award. She has presented on legal research and animal law topics at AALL, Mid-America Association of Law Libraries, and Southwestern Association of Law Libraries annual meetings, as well as at continuing legal education programs.