Courtesy of Yale Law School

Heather Gerken, the dean of Yale Law School, will leave the University in August to lead one of the wealthiest charitable foundations in the world.

After eight years as the Law School’s dean and nearly two decades on its faculty, in November, Gerken will take over the Ford Foundation, a philanthropic organization focused on combating social inequality. 

On Tuesday morning, University President Maurie McInnis and Provost Scott Strobel announced Gerken’s departure in an email sent to the Yale community. The University leaders congratulated Gerken and praised her leadership, recognizing her work to expand access to the law school and foster intellectual rigor. 

“She was a powerful dean with brilliant organizational skills,” Robert Post LAW ’77, a Law School professor and Gerken’s immediate predecessor as dean, wrote to the News. “She kept a steady hand during tumultuous times. Her focus on financial aid has been enormously important.”

Gerken, a constitutional and election law scholar, assumed the deanship in 2017. The first woman to serve as the Law School’s dean, she leaves the University before her second five-year term was set to expire in 2027. 

Yale Law School faculty and students alike applauded Gerken for her commitment to expanding access to the school, especially for low-income students, and three faculty members praised her leadership throughout various challenges, including the COVID-19 pandemic and freedom of expression controversies. 

Her deanship was marked by initiatives to increase the law school’s affordability, including the creation of the Hurst Horizon Scholarship Program, which offers full tuition scholarships to students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. 

In April, Gerken published an op-ed in the Boston Globe encouraging the importance of embracing low-income students rather than chasing school rankings. She withdrew Yale Law School from U.S. News law school ranking in 2022, describing the U.S. News metrics as “damaging.” 

Under Gerken’s leadership, the shares of students entering the Law School whose parents did not attend college or professional school grew significantly. The number of military veterans enrolled in incoming classes increased from 1 percent to nearly 10 percent from 2017 to 2024.

“While it’s difficult to imagine leaving the Law School we all love, I am thrilled to take on this new and exciting challenge,” Gerken is quoted as saying in a Law School press release on Tuesday. “The work of this moment is the work of my life, and I feel incredibly lucky to have the opportunity to helm such an extraordinary philanthropic organization.” 

Faculty praise Gerken’s leadership through challenges

Miriam Gohara, deputy dean for experiential education at the Law School, described Gerken as a compassionate and visionary leader. 

“Soon after assuming the deanship, we were struck with the pandemic, and she had to go into an unprecedented mode of leadership.” Gohara told the News. “She pulled us through that so skillfully, and we were able to get through that without having to lay off staff and make significant cuts.”

During her tenure, Gerken navigated controversies regarding free speech on campus. In March 2022, students disrupted an event featuring speaker Kristen Waggoner, then-general counsel of the conservative Christian legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom. Students who protested the event took issue with the group’s anti-LGBTQ stances.

Though Gerken called the students’ conduct “unacceptable,” she concluded that the protest did not violate Yale’s free speech policies and did not pursue disciplinary action against any protestors, which drew criticism from members of the Federalist Society, the Law School student organization that hosted the event.

During her deanship, Gerken clashed with Amy Chua, the celebrity Law School professor who wrote “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother” and is close with Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh ’87 LAW ’90 and U.S. Vice President JD Vance LAW ’13. 

After a group of students accused Chua of hosting inappropriate, alcohol-fueled dinner parties at her home during the pandemic, Gerken responded by removing Chua from teaching a small group seminar for first-year law students, drawing criticism from faculty members who felt Gerken was acting prematurely.

Chua denied the dinner party allegations at the time, and criticized the school’s handling of her small group leadership status.

Despite these controversies, however, Law School faculty, administrators, students and alumni praised Gerken’s leadership. 

Gohara said Gerken has really “encouraged meaningful differences of opinion.” John Morley LAW ‘06, an investment funds professor at the Law School, similarly described that the dean “thoughtfully” maintained her commitment to academic freedom and the expression of ideas. Morley praised her steadiness and integrity when navigating controversial situations. 

“Academic freedom is not a license to do anything, but it is a core value of the Law School,” Morley said. He believed that through her time as a senior administrator, Gerken “developed a strong and judicious sense of where the lines are and how to maintain the law school’s core commitments.”

Students, faculty speak to Gerken’s kindness, legacy 

Emma Sokoloff-Rubin ’11 LAW ’18, the director of the law school’s San Francisco Affirmative Litigation Project — a partnership Gerken founded between the Law School and the San Francisco Attorney’s Office — described the outgoing dean as “brilliant and witty and passionate and kind,” noting her attention to each student’s growth and contribution. 

Professor Akhil Reed Amar ’80 LAW ’84, whose daughter was close friends with Gerken’s daughter growing up, described Gerken as a “shiningly decent” individual with “tremendous talent.” He remarked on her kindness and graciousness, and said that Yale’s loss was the Ford Foundation’s gain. 

Professor Justin Driver described Gerken as “the greatest law school leader of her generation” and claimed that her leadership altered American higher education. 

“Her legacy is awesome — in both the old-school and the new-school senses of that word,” Driver wrote to the News. “Heather seamlessly blends qualities that are seldom glimpsed in the same human being — visionary and tireless, brilliant and personable, charismatic and detail-oriented, brave and prudent.” 

Sarah Donilon ’19 LAW ’26, who worked as Gerken’s speechwriter, said she envies the Ford Foundation’s team because Gerken was “an ideal boss.” Donilon highlighted Gerken’s warmth and humor and said she had a “strong sense” of her overarching mission, while making sure to pay equal attention to “small kindnesses” for individuals. 

“She would never just read a rote, Wikipedia-like biography of someone; she wanted to give a personal tribute to each and every person,” Donilon wrote, regarding Gerken’s introductions for guest speakers. “I’ve seen the same when she took the time to write encouraging thank-you notes to student speechwriters.”

Gohara said that Gerken put the Law School in a “very strong” financial position and is leaving the law school in “really good shape.” Morley echoed these remarks, noting that she improved the schools financial condition “substantially.”

According to the Tuesday message, the University is working to appoint an interim dean and will soon begin the search process for the next YLS dean. 

Gerken’s successor will be the Law School’s 18th dean.