Larry Kramer announced he will resign as dean of Stanford Law School in September in order to assume the presidency of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.
Kramer, who has been dean since 2004, oversaw a series of curricular changes that helped propel the school above Harvard Law School in this year’s U.S. News & World Report.
“Larry Kramer transformed the Stanford Law School, both physically and programmatically, said Stanford Acting President and Provost John Etchemendy. “He pioneered a new vision of legal education and then oversaw the creation of a physical plant capable of supporting the new program. His vision has benefited not only law students but the university at large, by integrating the law school with the rest of the university.”
During Kramer’s tenure, the law school spearheaded new opportunities for legal education and a multi-dimensional JD degree that combines law with the study of other disciplines. The education effort emphasizes team-oriented, problem-solving techniques together with expanded clinical training that allows students to represent clients and litigate cases while in school.
Kramer also spearheaded a renewed commitment to public service and public interest law. He championed deeper integration between the law school and the broader university, encouraging law students to be more multidisciplinary while also integrating law into disciplines throughout Stanford, such as engineering, business and medicine.
Kramer will leave Stanford on Aug. 31 to lead the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, a Menlo Park-based philanthropic organization focused on solving social and environmental problems around the world, with an endowment of more than $7 billion.
Kramer graduated from the University of Chicago Law School in 1984. He clerked for Judge Henry J. Friendly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit and then for U.S. Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan. Kramer joined the faculty at the University of Chicago Law School in 1986 and became a full professor in 1990. He moved to the University of Michigan Law School in 1991 and then to NYU in 1994.
