Ellen Schall

Ellen Schall is the dean of the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York Unversity and its Martin Cherkasky Professor of Health Policy & Management

From the days of her first career as a Legal Aid attorney, to her tenure as commissioner of a local government agency, and through her experiences leading the NYU Wagner faculty and administration, Dean Schall's work has shifted commonly held notions of leadership from a focus on the attributes of an individual to an investment in the collective work of a group.

Former NYC Mayor Edward I. Koch appointed Schall Commissioner for the New York City Department of Juvenile Justice in 1983. While in that role, Schall built a highly successful, effective team of existing and new staff members, transforming a troubled agency into one that Harvard University and the Ford Foundation selected to win their prestigious Innovations Award. The 1989 PBS documentary "Excellence in the Public Sector with Tom Peters" highlights her work to restructure the American model for juvenile justice.

Schall joined the NYU Wagner faculty in 1992 as the Martin Cherkasky Professor of Health Policy and Management. She and her faculty colleague, Sonia Ospina, cultivated a partnership with the Ford Foundation which led to the establishment of the Research Center for Leadership in Action (RCLA), a permanent research center at Wagner. In 2002, the Wagner faculty unanimously recommended that NYU's President John Sexton appoint Schall Dean. Since taking up this role, Schall has led the school's trajectory from an institution with a strong local and regional reputation to one that is widely recognized in national and international arenas – and ranked #10 overall in the most recent U.S. News & World Report rankings of schools of public affairs, policy, administration, and management.

Dean Schall's achievements are not limited to city government and academic arenas. She has participated on the Selection Committee for the Innovations in American Government Awards run by the Kennedy School of Government completing a five year term in 2004, and beginning a new term in 2006. Dean Schall became a member of the Women's Forum, Inc - a community of New York women leaders - in 2007. In 2008, Dean Schall became a member of the newly-formed New York State Juvenile Justice Task Force.

Her legacy is one of helping to transform organizations by encouraging others to step up to their own leadership potential. Under her leadership, NYU Wagner is poised to take its place as the flagship school of public service education and research by: supporting faculty research that changes the way people frame, understand, analyze, and act on public issues and policies; creating enterprising models of public service education; advancing original concepts of leadership development; and inspiring the next generation of public service professionals.

Dean Schall received a B.A. from Swarthmore College and J.D. (cum laude) from NYU School of Law.