Pedro A. Noguera Named Dean of the Rossier School of Education at USC

Pedro A. Noguera, Distinguished Professor at the UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies, has been named Dean of the Rossier School of Education at the University of Southern California.

“Dr. Pedro Noguera is a gifted scholar and very talented colleague who has long been engaged in the effort to improve schools and address the inequities that confront too many children in our systems of public education,” said Marcelo Suárez-Orozco,” Wasserman Dean of the UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies.  “He is also an committed citizen and community leader whose talents will add greatly to USC’s efforts, and enhance the collaboration between our two great universities as we seek to improve educational opportunities for young people across the region and nation. It is for me a bittersweet adieuto valued colleague and dear friend. I look forward to continue to learn from Pedro’s leadership in education form his new perch at USC. We wish him all the best in this important new endeavor.”

Noguera is the founder of the UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools. 

At UCLA, his research and teaching has focused on the ways in which schools are influenced by social and economic conditions and has been deeply engaged in efforts to further educational equity. In April 2020, Professor Noguera was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

“I am excited and looking forward to the opportunity to serve as the next Dean of the Rossier School of Education at the University of Southern California,” Noguera said.  “It will be a tremendous honor to work with its distinguished faculty, its outstanding students and its highly accomplished alumni in the years ahead.  I have enjoyed my time at UCLA and the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies and am happy that the two universities have a long history of collaboration. I intend to continue to work with my colleagues at UCLA on several ongoing projects that are of critical importance to the field of education, and to support the students I have taught and advised there.”  

Noguera joined UCLA in 2015. Prior to joining the UCLA faculty, Noguera held appointments in the departments of Teaching and Learning and Humanities and Social Sciences at the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Development at New York University, and served as an affiliated faculty member in NYU’s Department of Sociology. He has also held tenured faculty appointments at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (2000-2003), where he was named the Judith K. Dimon Professor of Communities and Schools, and at the University of California, Berkeley (1990-2000), where he was also the Director of the Institute for the Study of Social Change. From 2008 – 2011, Noguera was an appointee of the Governor of New York to the State University of New York (SUNY) Board of Trustees. He also served as Executive Director of the Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the Transformation of Schools. Noguera was elected to the National Academy of Education in 2014. 

At UCLA, Noguera recently co-authored “Beyond the Schoolhouse: Overcoming Challenges and Expanding Opportunities for Black Youth in LA County,” a policy report examining conditions confronting Black students in the region.  Noguera has published more than 200 research and scholarly articles, monographs, research reports, and editorials on topics such as urban school reform, education policy, conditions that promote student achievement, the role of education in community development, youth violence, and race and ethnic relations in American society. 

Noguera is also the author of thirteen books, most recently “The Crisis of Connection and Pursuit of Our Common Humanity” (NYU Press, 2018) with Niobe Way, Carol Gilligan and Alisha Ali and, “Race, Equity and Education: The Pursuit of Equality in Education 60 Years After Brown” (New York: Springer Press). 

Professor Noguera recently received awards from the Center for the Advanced Study of the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University, from the National Association of Secondary Principals, and from the McSilver Institute at NYU for his research and advocacy efforts aimed at fighting poverty.

Professor Noguera will begin his new position as Dean on July 1.