UVA Clubs: "Through the Lens" with Gerard Robinson

All alumni, friends, and families are invited to join us for Through the Lens, a virtual faculty lecture series brought to you by the UVA Clubs Global Network. In November, we'll be joined by Gerard Robinson, a professor of practice in public policy and law at the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy and the School of Law at the University of Virginia.

Professor Gerard Robinson will lead a conversation on "Prisons and the Philosophy of Punishment: A Global View".

Attendees can expect a robust discussion of:

• Prison 101 overview for the U.S. (1.8M) and the globe (11M).
• Learnings from visits to prisons in Norway, Germany, Brazil, and Kenya during 2023-2024.
• Recommendations on what we can do in U.S. prisons to address our current philosophy of punishment.

We hope you'll join us for an engaging discussion!

Faculty designation: Education Inside Prisons Fund. Donations will support "Prisons and the Philosophy of Punishment" discussions with UVA undergraduate and graduate students each semester, and it will support a lunch or dinner conversation (up to 10 people) with UVA alumni in Charlottesville, Richmond, NOVA, SW VA, and DC.

About our speaker:

Gerard Robinson is a Professor of Practice in Public Policy and Law at the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy at the University of Virginia and has a joint appointment at the UVA School of Law. His areas of expertise are K-12 and higher education, criminal justice reform, race in American institutions, and the role of nonprofit organizations in civil society. Examples of his scholarship include Education for Liberation: The Politics of Promise and Reform Inside and Beyond America’s Prisons (2019) as well as an essay published in the University of Virginia Law Review (2023) and University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law & Social Change (2022). He has been published or quoted in CNN Opinion, Forbes, Newsweek, Richmond Times-Dispatch, The Hill, The New York Times, The Washington Examiner, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and U.S. News & World Report. Between 2020-2023, Robinson co-hosted the popular Learning Curve Podcast with Dr. Cara Candal where they interviewed scholars, entrepreneurs, public and private sector leaders, and 13 Pulitzer Prize winners.  

During 2023-2024, Robinson traveled to Norway, Germany, Brazil, and Kenya to meet with correctional staff, educators, nonprofit leaders, and government officials to learn about their programs for incarcerated adults. 

From 2017 to 2020, Robinson was Executive Director of the Center for Advancing Opportunity. It was a Washington, D.C.-based research and education initiative created by a partnership with the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, the Charles Koch Foundation, and Koch Industries. In that role, he oversaw an $11 million investment into evidence-based solutions to the most pressing education, entrepreneurship, and criminal justice issues throughout the United States by working with faculty and students at HBCUs and other postsecondary institutions. He also managed the process with Gallup researchers to gather opinions about education, criminal justice, and economic mobility from a national representative sample of more than 18,000 residents living in 49 states and the District of Columbia. Results from the national research project are published in The State of Opportunity in America Report in 2018, 2019, and 2020.  

From 2011 to 2012, Robinson served as Commissioner of Education for the State of Florida, where he managed 3,000 employees dispersed over several divisions. In addition to supporting the education initiatives of Governor Rick Scott, Robinson assisted in the development of a $16 billion education budget, and instituted for the first time in a decade new achievement level scores for grades three through ten in reading and grades three through eight in mathematics. He also chaired a task force to improve opportunities for English learners and students with special needs, adopted new competency and skill standards for STEM teacher certification, developed new pre- and post-assessment measures for the voluntary pre-K program, and approved several new degree programs for the Florida College System. 

Before working for the State of Florida, Robinson served as Secretary of Education for the Commonwealth of Virginia. In addition to supporting the education initiatives of Governor Bob McDonnell, he provided guidance to 16 public universities, the community college system, five higher education and research centers, the Department of Education, and state-supported museums. Robinson managed the governor’s Opportunity to Learn agenda in 2010, which produced new laws for traditional public schools, virtual schools, charter schools, and college laboratory schools. In 2011, he directed the Top Jobs for the 21st Century agenda, which produced the Virginia Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2011 to support conferral of 100,000 additional degrees by 2025. 

Between 2005 and 2010, Robinson was a Program Director and later the President of the Black Alliance for Educational Options, which was a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit organization that supported federal and state parental choice policies empowering low-income and working-class black families. He has testified before local school boards, state legislative and regulatory officials, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and on Capitol Hill. He also has spoken before academic, nonprofit, and corporate audiences in the United States, at the University of Oxford in England, and the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. Other international education tours include travel to China, the Dominican Republic, Egypt, Gambia, Haiti, Israel, and Senegal.  

Robinson, a first-generation college graduate, earned an Ed.M. from Harvard University, a B.A. from Howard University, and an A.A. from El Camino Community College. He is married and has three daughters. 

This is an online event; the Zoom link to join us will be sent via email before the event.

Through the Lens is a virtual faculty lecture series highlighting faculty from across Grounds whose research and knowledge promote intellectual discourse. Enjoy these riveting topics from the comfort of your own home - learn like our current Hoos when we bring the professors to you!

If you have any questions regarding this event, please contact Said Aweis (Ed '22), Regional Engagement Officer, UVA Clubs Global Network, at gpn7jp@virginia.edu.