Nancy Thomas

Nancy Thomas is Senior Advisor to the President for Democracy Initiatives and Executive Director of the Institute for Democracy & Higher Education (IDHE) at the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U). IDHE is an applied research center that studies campus climates for political learning and engagement; pro-democracy teaching and learning; protecting academic freedom; balancing speech and inclusion; and higher education’s role in a democracy in question. 

Dr. Thomas has authored and edited many articles, book chapters, special issues of journals, discussion guides, and a guide for training facilitators to manage politically charged discussions, as well as the monograph, Educating for Deliberative Democracy, part of Jossey-Bass New Directions for Higher Education series. 

From 2015–2020, she served as an associate editor for the Journal of Public Deliberation. She currently serves on several advisory boards and committees, including the University of California’s National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement, the Andrew Goodman Foundation, the Conflict Transformation Collaborative at Middlebury College, and the Faculty Engagement Network at the Scholars Strategy Network. 

Dr. Thomas attended St. Lawrence University (BA), Case Western Reserve University School of Law (JD), and the Harvard Graduate School of Education (EdD). In 2023, she received the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Alumni Council Award for Innovation in Education.