Upon graduation from law school, Ordinary Professor J.P. "Sandy" Ogilvy, practiced law with Gregory, Clyman, and Ogilvy from 1973 to 1975 and then with Legal Services for Northwest Pennsylvania and the Legal Aid Society of Cincinnati from 1976 to 1979. He earned an LL.M in Advocacy from the Georgetown University Law Center in 1982 and worked in GULC's Center for Applied Legal Studies clinic during the 1982-83 academic year. He began full-time law teaching at Thurgood Marshall School of Law, Texas Southern University, in 1983, where he developed several clinical programs in which he taught and supervised students. He also taught civil procedure and contracts.

He joined the faculty of the Columbus School of Law, The Catholic University of America, in 1991 to teach civil procedure and interviewing, counseling, and negotiation skills, and to become its Coordinator of Clinical Programs, a position he held until 2006. Currently, Professor Ogilvy is the Director of the Office of Law & Social Justice Initiatives and the Director of the National Archive of Clinical Legal Education, which is housed at the Kathryn J. DuFour Law Library at Columbus School of Law. He currently teaches Civil Procedure, Torts, and directs the Innocence Project Clinic & Clemency Project.

Professor Ogilvy is a past chair of the AALS Section on Pro Bono and Public Service Opportunities and a past chair of the AALS Section on Clinical Legal Education and currently is the historian for the organization. In addition to articles on the courts, pedagogical issues, and clinical legal education, he is the author (with Professors Leah Wortham, Lisa Lerman, Lucia Silecchia, Stacy Brustin, Margaret Barry, Assistant Dean Georgia Niedzielko, and Professor Liz Ryan Cole of Vermont Law School) of Learning from Practice: A Professional Development Text for Legal Externs, 2d ed. (Thomson/West 2007). Professor Ogilvy helped develop two listservs related to clinical legal education, "Lawclinic", hosted by Washburn University School of Law, and "Lextern", which is devoted to discussion of issues related to legal externship programs, hosted by The Catholic University of America. He also manages the LexternWeb website for the use of faculty and administrators of Legal Externship programs. Professor Ogilvy was awarded the 2003 William Pincus Award by the Association of American Law Schools Section on Clinical Legal Education for outstanding contributions to the cause of clinical legal education and the advancement of justice. In 2013, he was awarded the Father Robert F. Drinan Award by the AALS Section on Pro Bono and Public Service Opportunities for forwarding the ethic of pro bono and public service in law schools through personal service, program design and management.

Professor Ogilvy received his bachelor's degree from Portland State University in 1968 and, after a two-year hiatus defending our country's northern border as a member of the U.S. Army in Alaska, his J.D. from Northwestern School of Law of Lewis and Clark College in 1973. He and his wife, Louise Howells, who also is a law school professor, are the parents of twin boys.