Class of 2011
Steve Cozen grew up with sports. One might say, he was born with sports in his blood, for his father was Sam Cozen, the venerable coach at Overbrook High School and Drexel University. Steve played football, baseball and basketball in high school, and baseball and basketball at the University of Pennsylvania, where he later went to law school. Steve then founded a law firm that under his leadership grew from four lawyers in 1970 to over 550 lawyers in 2011, located in 24 offices throughout the Unites States, the United Kingdom and Canada. Steve has been included in a variety of publications designating him in a category, the heading of which depends upon the publication, as one of the “Leading”, “Best”, “Super Lawyer”, “Most Powerful” and “Influential” lawyers in America.
Steve never forgot the importance of team sports in his own life, and he headed the development of, and continues to remain actively involved in, the Police Athletic League Center named after his father, Samuel D. Cozen. The center is of course a sports facility, but in addition to sports it also provides a broad range of education, recreation and social services for inner-city children and their families – all without charge.
In addition to the public and private company boards on which he serves, Steve serves on numerous education and philanthropic boards, including The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, The National Museum of American Jewish History, the University of Pennsylvania’s Law School Board of Overseers, and Steven Spielberg’s University of Southern California Shoah Foundation Institute – creator of the largest archive of Holocaust testimonies in the world. He has received numerous awards, including The Anti-Defamation League’s highest honor – The 25th Annual Americanism Award, and the 2008 Musser Excellence in Leadership Award from Temple University’s Fox School of Business. Recently, Cozen O’Connor dedicated the Stephen A. Cozen Chair to the University of Pennsylvania Law School.
Steve and his wife, Sandy, parents of three daughters and grandparents of seven, live in Villanova.