Tomiko Brown-Nagin, one of the nation’s leading experts in educational law and policy, history, and constitutional law, will be the next dean of the Stanford Graduate School of Education (GSE), Provost Jenny Martinez announced today.
Brown-Nagin joins Stanford from Harvard Radcliffe Institute, where she has served as dean since 2018. She will begin her appointment as dean of the GSE on Nov. 1, succeeding Daniel L. Schwartz, who has served as the I. James Quillen Dean for the past 11 years.
Brown-Nagin is a distinguished interdisciplinary scholar whose research is deeply entwined with the history of education in the United States and educational law and policy.
A leader in higher education, she has brought that perspective to reimagining what institutions can do for students and communities. While dean of Harvard Radcliffe Institute, Brown-Nagin led the institute through an ambitious five-year strategic vision, broadened a competitive fellowship to include fields from AI to the arts, and expanded opportunities for students to engage with interdisciplinary research, courses, and activities, including launching an emerging leaders program that pairs high school sophomores with Harvard undergraduate mentors – and now one of the largest community service offerings at Harvard.
“Brown-Nagin brings a deep record of interdisciplinary scholarship, strong experience leading organizations and institutional initiatives, and both a professional record and personal style of working with people from varied disciplines and perspectives to advance common goals,” Martinez said. “That integrative approach is well suited to the academic work of the GSE and to the GSE community, and will also help the school continue to build ties across the university. President Levin and I are thrilled to have her join Stanford’s leadership team.”
Since its founding in 1917, the GSE’s faculty, students, and alumni have worked to solve education’s greatest challenges and improve lives through research, teaching, and driving change in practice and policy.
“I came to the GSE because its mission is my mission,” said Brown‑Nagin. “I am deeply purpose‑driven, and I am committed to working alongside this community of innovative and collaborative scholars who are grappling with the most complex problems educators face today to ensure that every student has access to a high‑quality education. I look forward to seeing what we can accomplish together.”
A throughline across all of Brown-Nagin’s research is understanding the relationship between people and institutions and how they influence and interact with educational access and opportunity.
“My research agenda concerns the distribution of opportunities in American society, how law structures opportunities in education, and how people and institutions shape each other,” Brown‑Nagin said. “I’ve long been interested in how education can be a true engine of opportunity.”
“Tomiko Brown-Nagin’s career is an inspiring blend of deep academic excellence, integrative leadership, and a proven commitment to institutional change,” said Daniel McFarland, a professor of education and co-chair of the search committee. “She’s had a career-long focus on civil rights history and equal protection, so she will be a fierce advocate of equitable access to quality education. She’s also had a great deal of experience leading and uniting diverse minds as the dean of the Radcliffe Institute. Those intellectual and leadership experiences make her exceptionally well-suited to leading Stanford’s GSE.”
Brown-Nagin’s commitment to aligning values with institutional practice shaped her leadership at Harvard, where she oversaw university-wide endeavors, including chairing the Presidential Committee on Harvard and the Legacy of Slavery and coauthoring the committee’s report detailing the university’s direct, financial, and intellectual ties to slavery. In 2024, she co-chaired Harvard’s Working Group on Open Inquiry and Constructive Dialogue, a cross-campus effort that examined how to enhance a culture of open inquiry and constructive dialogue at Harvard.
Brown-Nagin previously held leadership roles at Harvard Law School, including serving as the faculty director of the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute (2017–2019) and as codirector of the Program of Study in Law and History (2013–2018).
This is a moment of remarkable opportunity for education, and particularly at the GSE, said Schwartz, who announced in February that he would step down as dean. “There are beautiful new buildings at the heart of the university, new faculty representing the many disciplines that speak to education, strong regional partnerships for teacher training and research, collaborations with technology companies, and a fabulous new dean with intellectual breadth and vibrancy. I look forward to the creative evolution of how the GSE continues to improve lives through learning.”
Schwartz will return to teaching and research full time and continue to lead the Stanford Accelerator for Learning, a university-wide initiative based at the GSE that researches and scales effective learning solutions.
