Julian Vasquez Heilig

Julian Vasquez Heilig’s great-grandmother participated in the 1963 March on Washington and heard Martin Luther King Jr.’s stirring “I Have a Dream” speech. His uncle was involved in the Chicano activist group Crusade for Justice. 

“My family has roots of advocacy and activism,” he says. “You can see that threaded through the work I do.”

Vasquez Heilig, a scholar and advocate who focuses on improving educational outcomes for historically underserved populations, says his background and experience allows him to put his values into practice, at scale.

In California, his work on local control and accountability helped lead to policies that encourage schools and community members to work together on goals and strategy. At the University of Kentucky, where he served as dean of the College of Education, and at Western Michigan University, where he served as provost and is now a professor of educational leadership, he increased diversity, enrollment, and retention, including for students of color.

Vasquez Heilig cites the influence of his mentor, GSE Professor Emerita Linda Darling-Hammond, whom he describes as “unwilling to separate research from its consequences.” 

That commitment to high-quality research to inform policies that enable equitable education is at the heart of Vasquez Heilig’s advocacy for marginalized students.

“I’ve never been satisfied with the status quo,” he says.