Kathryn Monroe

Kathryn Monroe serves as legal counsel at Alliance Defending Freedom, where she draws on her experience as a former educator to focus on parental rights and education freedom issues. Her practice encompasses legislative review, model legislation development, testimony support, and legal analysis on issues affecting parents, students, and religious educational institutions.

Monroe’s experience spans constitutional litigation, government service, and private practice. She has litigated cases on behalf of parent intervenors and state defendants to uphold the constitutionality of educational choice programs and has drafted and reviewed proposed legislation for compliance with state and federal constitutions.

As counsel in a state attorney general’s office, Monroe oversaw special projects and managed the office’s legislative activities. She litigated parents’ rights to access information about their children from public schools and to protect students from harmful policies imposed without parental knowledge or consent. Monroe led investigations to enforce protections for free speech, civil rights, and religious liberty. Across practices, Monroe researched and drafted state and federal regulatory guidance and represented governmental entities and agencies in administrative proceedings.

In private practice and nonprofit work, Monroe advised educational institutions—from early childhood programs through higher education—on governance, compliance, and operations, including guiding Christian schools and ministries through complex legal landscapes while preserving their religious mission.

Before entering the legal profession, Monroe worked as an elementary teacher and district-wide school administrator, giving her firsthand insight into the challenges educators and families face. Her earlier legal experience includes clerkships and internships with the Office of White House Counsel; the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions; the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission; the U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights; and the Texas Education Agency. Monroe attended SMU Dedman School of Law and Georgetown University Law Center, earning her J.D. from SMU. She also holds an Ed.M. in Education Policy and Analysis from Harvard Graduate School of Education.