The Stanford Graduate School of Education (GSE) announced Wednesday that Tomiko Brown-Nagin, who has served as the dean of the Radcliffe Institute since 2018, will leave Harvard to serve as the school’s dean, effective November 1.
While at Radcliffe, Brown-Nagin has expanded its fellowship program to academics and artists from a range of institutions, and more than doubled the number of Harvard students who engage with Radcliffe through research, courses, and programming.
She has also taken on University-wide work since stepping in to lead Radcliffe: in 2019, she was appointed chair of the Presidential Committee on Harvard and the Legacy of Slavery, which issued a landmark report detailing the University’s direct, financial, and intellectual ties to slavery in 2022. In the wake of the report, Harvard committed $100 million to redress harms to descendant communities in the United States and the Caribbean.
In a letter to the community announcing Brown-Nagin’s departure, University President Alan M. Garber ’76 praised her work leading the Legacy of Slavery committee, which he described as “one of the most far-reaching acts of institutional self-examination in our history.”
“Her leadership of that effort, as humane as it was rigorous, reflected the best of what it means to be a scholar in service to a community, an institution, and a nation,” Garber wrote.
In an email to Radcliffe affiliates, Brown-Nagin wrote that at Stanford she would be “in a position to help strengthen American education and its unique power to expand opportunity.”
“This is a longstanding commitment of mine personally, as an educator and a scholar. I am particularly eager to undertake this work now, at a moment of unprecedented challenge and of rapid technological change,” she wrote.
Harvard has not yet announced plans to search for Brown-Nagin’s successor.
At Stanford, Brown-Nagin will succeed Daniel Schwartz, who has served in the role since 2015. In February, Schwartz announced his plans to step down and return to full-time teaching on Sept. 1, and a national search for his successor ensued.
In a statement, Stanford Provost Jenny Martinez praised Brown-Nagin’s range of leadership and academic experience.
She “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.
Brown-Nagin, who also held faculty appointments at Harvard Law School and in the University’s history department, will similarly be affiliated with Stanford’s history department and law school.
In Stanford’s announcement, multiple members of that university’s search committee praised Brown-Nagin’s breadth of leadership experience and skill for making connections across academic disciplines and institutions.
“What also stood out is her unshakable commitment to educational excellence and opportunity, which is rooted in her own personal experience and has guided her life’s work as a scholar and leader,” said Phil Halperin, chair of the advisory council at the Stanford GSE and search committee member.
