Hon. Reba Ann Page, J.D., Ph.D.

Judge
headshot of female judge wearing red glasses with American flag in background
she, her, hers

Summary

Judge Reba Ann Page was appointed to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Board of Contract Appeals on July 1, 1994, and became chief judge on January 30, 1999. She became a judge on the US. Armed Services Board of Contract Appeals in July 2000 by the merger of these tribunals within the U.S. Department of Defense. These fora share concurrent jurisdiction over federal government contract litigation with the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, and primarily adjudicate matters involving complex construction and major weapons systems. In addition to rendering judicial opinions that are appealable only to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, she frequently sits by designation as a mediator for the ASBCA. Judge Page is a native Kentuckian and received her B.A. and M.S. in biology from the University of Louisville, where she was admitted prior to completing high school. She was honored as the university’s 2025 “alumni of the year” for the College of Arts & Sciences. Her first master’s thesis in limnology (freshwater ecology) was entitled “A Study of Select Chemical and Bacteriological Parameters on the Ohio River in Jefferson County, Kentucky.” Judge Page received her J.D. from the university’s Brandeis School of Law. She is admitted to the bar in Kentucky, Florida, and the District of Columbia, and is active in the American Bar Association. Judge Page served for over a decade as a committee chair for the Public Contract Law Section and an editor for the Public Contract Law Journal, and is past president of the Boards of Contract Appeals Judges Association. In 2005, she received the “Distinguished Alumni Award” from the School of Law. Before becoming a judge, she served as chief counsel for a 14-state region of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Ohio River Division (1988-1994); as Division Trial Attorney (1986-88); and as Assistant District Counsel for the Corps’ Louisville District (1984-1986). She twice received the Department of Army Meritorious Civilian Service Award and was given the Superior Civilian Service Award, the Commander's Award, and the E. Manning Seltzer Award. Prior to entering federal service, Judge Page was the Deputy Commissioner of the Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection and before that was in corporate practice with a major consulting consortium.

She frequently lectures and publishes on government contracts, mediation and dispute resolution, constitutional law/civil rights, judicial writing and ethics, and has taught for the National Judicial College since 2001. In 2011, Judge Page received a master’s degree in judicial studies from the University of Nevada, Reno. Her thesis, “The Curious Case of Mr. Bingo,” explored the unlikely intersection of federal procurement law and the history of charitable gaming law in Kentucky. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Nevada, Reno in 2017, where her dissertation, “Wringing Their Bread from the Sweat of Other Men’s Faces: The Persistent Use of Forced Labor in the Antebellum South,” examined the historic use of peonage (debt enslavement), the misuse of convict labor, racially motivated violence and the struggle for civil rights.

Research interests

  • Constitutional law
  • Alternative dispute resolution
  • Ethics
  • Government contracts

Selected publications

  • Page, Reba Ann & Benes Z. Aldana, Judicial Education on Implicit Bias: Instilling a Lifelong Pursuit of Fairness, Chapter ii in Expanding Justice: Strategies to Increase Inclusion and Reduce Bias, Bernice B. Donald and Sarah E. Redfield, eds. (2023).
  • Page, Reba Ann & Robert J. Torres, Jr., As Judge and Citizen: An Ethical Path to Racial Justice, 57 Court Rev. 72 (2021).
  • Page, Reba Ann & Paul Williams, The ASBCA’s Path to the “Mega ADR” In Computer Sciences Corporation,” 49 Procurement Law. 1 (2013).
  • Page, Reba, Asserting a “Sum Certain”: A Brief Tutorial, 47 Procurement Law. 3 (2012).
  • Page, Reba Ann, The Curious Case of Mr. Bingo, 13 Gaming Law Rev. and Economics 221 (2009).
  • Ting, Peter D. & Reba Ann Page, Practice Pointers: A Short Primer on the Effective Preparation and Use of Rule 4 Files, 43 Procurement Law. 4 (2008).
  • Page, Reba, Entitlement to Interest under Section 12 of the Contract Disputes Act, Proceedings of the American Bar Association Section of Public Contract Law, “The CDA at Twenty: How’s It Going? Where to Now?” at Tab H (1998).
  • Page, Reba & Wesley C. Jockisch, Commemorating the Sixtieth Anniversary of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Board of Contract Appeals, 28 Pub. Cont. L.L. 373 (1997).
  • Page, Reba & Wesley C. Jockisch, Increasing the Voluntary Use of Judicially Assisted ADR, 36 No. 1 Judges’ J. 33 (Winter 1997).
  • Page, Reba & Wesley C. Jockisch, The Corps of Engineers Board of Contract Appeals Use of Alternative Dispute Resolution, 24 Pub. Con. L.J. 453 (Spring 1995).
  • Page, Reba & Wesley C. Jockisch, Board Appeals under the CDA: Better Never than Late? 32 Procurement Law. 4 (1997).
  • Page, Reba & Frederick J. Lees, ADR in Federal Government Contracting in Alternative Dispute Resolution in the Construction Industry, Robert F. Cushman et al eds., at pp. 255-287, New York: John Wiley & Sons (1991).
  • Page, Reba & Frederick J. Lees, Roles of Participants in the Mini-Trial, reprinted in Yearbook of Procurement Articles, vol. 26A at 445-68, John W. Whelan, ed., Washington DC: Federal Publications Inc. (1989) (originally published in 18 Pub. Cont. L.J. 54 (October 1988)).
  • Page, Reba & Frederick J. Lees, Roles of Participants in the Mini-Trial, 18 Pub. Cont. L.J. 54 (October 1988).

Dissertation and Master's Theses

  • Page, Reba Ann, 2017. Wringing Their Bread from the Sweat of Other Men’s Faces”: The Persistent Use of Forced Labor in the Postbellum South, Doctoral dissertation, University of Nevada, Reno.
  • Page, Reba Ann, 2009. The Curious Case of Mr. Bingo, Master’s Thesis, University of Nevada, Reno.
  • Page, Reba, 1983. A Study of Selected Chemical and Bacteriological Parameters on the Ohio River in Jefferson County, Kentucky, Master’s Thesis, University of Louisville.

Notable exhibitions or performances

  • Appellate Judges Education Institute, Threats to the Independence of the Judiciary (November 2024, Boston, MA)
  • American Bar Association, Public Contract Law Division – Over the past 30 years, I have made many presentations to the ABA PCL. Topics have included a retrospective of the 1978 Contract Disputes Act; mediation and other dispute resolution methods; trial practice; and jurisprudence. For the past 15 years, I have served on a panel that annually presents “The Most Important Case of the Year,” for which I prepared a paper (sample available on request).
  • American Judges Association – At the annual meeting in Philadelphia in August 2022, I made a presentation on When Justice Fails as part of a panel.
  • National Bar Association – At the annual meeting in Memphis in May 2022, I made a presentation on When Justice Fails as part of a panel.
  • Gulf South History & Humanities Conference, Presentation on “Reconstruction-Era Social Justice and the Freedmen’s Bureau Courts” in Pensacola in October 2018.
  • Association of Family and Conciliation Courts, Presentation on “Reconstruction-Era Social Justice and the Freedmen’s Bureau Courts” in Washington, D.C., in June 2018.
  • Tuskegee University Political Science Research Symposium, presentation on “Rising Above the Clouds of Ignorance, Narrowness, and Selfishness: The Enduring Legacy of Booker T. Washington and Tuskegee in America’s Struggle for Civil Rights” in Tuskegee, AL (planned presentation, to be rescheduled)

Courses taught

Partial listing of courses taught for the National Judicial College:

  • Civil Mediation (Faculty) (November 2026, Reno, NV)
  • Advanced Civil Mediation (Faculty) (August 2026, Reno, NV)
  • When Justice Fails: Threats to the Independence of the Judiciary (Faculty) (December 2025, Miami, FL)
  • Civil Mediation (Faculty) (November 2025, Reno, NV)
  • Civil Mediation (Faculty) (November 2024, Reno, NV)
  • Judicial Writing (Faculty) (May 2024, Wilmington, DE)
  • Enhancing Bench Skills for New Mexico ALJs (Faculty) (May 2024)
  • Advanced Judicial Writing (Faculty) (April 2024)
  • The Nature of the Judicial Process (Faculty) (October 2023, Baton Rouge, LA)
  • Raising the Quality of Your Written Decisions (Faculty) (June 2023, Dover, DE)
  • Judicial Writing (Faculty) (April 2023, Reno, NV)
  • Civil Mediation (Faculty Assistant/Coach) (September 2022)
  • Civil Mediation (Faculty Assistant/Coach) (May 2021)
  • Civil Mediation (Faculty Assistant/Coach) (October 2020)
  • Racial Fairness and the Courts: The Role of the Judge in Achieving Racial Justice in the Time of Racial Turmoil (November 2020)
  • When Justice Fails: Threats to the Independence of the Judiciary (December 2019, Montgomery, AL)
  • Contemporary Threats to Judicial Independence and Freedom of the Press (December 2018, Washington, D.C.)
  • Civil Mediation (Faculty Assistant) (May 2016, Reno, NV)
  • Dispute Resolution Skills – taught annually from 2002 through 2016 in multiple locations
  • Essential Fair Hearing Techniques, a special course for the Department of Agriculture National Appeals Division (July 2014, Reno, NV)
  • Civil Mediation (Faculty Assistant for Nancy Yeend) (December 2010, Reno, NV)
  • Civil Mediation (Faculty Assistant for Nancy Yeend) (June 2010, Reno, NV)

Education

  • Ph.D., Judicial Studies, University of Nevada, Reno, 2017
  • MJS, Judicial Studies, University of Nevada, Reno, 2010
  • M.S., Biology, University of Louisville, 1983
  • J.D., University of Louisville, 1976
  • B.A., Biology, University of Louisville, 1971