Julie Schmid Named AAUP Executive Director

Julie Schmid will join the AAUP as the Association’s executive director in October. The executive director, formerly called the general secretary, heads the national office staff.

Schmid is currently the chief of staff of AFT-Wisconsin, which represents higher education faculty as well as K–12 teachers and public employees throughout the state. She has worked for faculty unions around the country, including as coordinator for the Portland State University AAUP chapter and as an activist with COGS-UE Local 896, a union for graduate student employees at the University of Iowa, where Schmid earned her PhD in English. She served as a senior program officer in the AAUP’s Department of Organizing and Services from 2002 to 2008.

“I am thrilled to welcome Julie Schmid as the new executive director of the AAUP,” said AAUP president Rudy Fichtenbaum. “She was the consensus choice of the AAUP Council. She brings a wealth of experience as an activist, organizer, and leader to the position of executive director and will help lead the AAUP in a new direction at a time when not only academic freedom, shared governance, and economic security for faculty and academic professionals but also the very survival of accessible, affordable, and high-quality public education are seriously endangered.”