Na’ilah Suad Nasir, Board President

President, Spencer Foundation

Na’ilah Suad Nasir is the sixth President of the Spencer Foundation, which funds education research nationally. Prior to joining Spencer, she held a faculty appointment in Education and African American Studies at the University of California, Berkeley where she also served as the chair of African American Studies, then later as the Vice Chancellor for Equity and Inclusion. She also served on the Faculty of the Stanford Graduate School of Education.

Nasir’s research examines the racialized and cultural nature of learning and schooling, with a particular focus on the experiences of African American students in schools and communities. She recently co-edited The Handbook of the Cultural Foundations of Learning (Routledge) and We Dare Say Love: Supporting Achievement in the Educational Life of Black Boys. She is also the author of Racialized Identities: Race and achievement for African-American youth, published by the Stanford University Press in 2012. Nasir is a member of the National Academy of Education and a Fellow of the American Educational Research Association. She is President (2021-2022) of the American Educational Research Association.