Julie J. Park

Julie J. Park is associate professor of education at the University of Maryland, College Park. Her research addresses racial equity in higher education, with a focus on the campus racial climate and college admissions. She also studies the complex ways that Asian Americans are affected by structural advantage and/or disadvantage in the realm of education. Her book Race on Campus: Debunking Myths with Data (Harvard Education Press, 2018) tackles misconceptions about how race and diversity work in higher education. She is also the author of When Diversity Drops: Race, Religion, and Affirmative Action in Higher Education (Rutgers University Press, 2013), an examination of how universities are affected by bans on affirmative action.

She is currently working on a project funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation examining the impact of test-optional policies and the future of college admissions. Her work has also been supported by the National Science Foundation. Besides being published in academic journals, her commentary has appeared in venues like the Washington Post, the Huffington Post, and the Chronicle of Higher Education. She served as a consulting expert in the landmark lawsuit Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard on the side of Harvard. Dr. Park earned her Ph.D. in Education from UCLA (Higher Education and Organizational Change), with a graduate concentration in Asian American Studies, and B.A. at Vanderbilt University (Sociology, English, and Women's Studies).