Lani Guinier and Deborah Bial | Talks at Google

Prof. Lani Guinier and Dr. Deborah Bial visited Google's Cambridge, MA office to discuss Prof. Guinier's book, "The Tyranny of the Meritocracy: Democratizing Higher Education in America", and topics of related interest.
Lani Guinier is the first woman of color appointed to a tenured professorship at Harvard Law School. Previously, she had been a tenured professor at the Univ. of Penn. law school; a lawyer with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund during the 1980s; Special Assistant to the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights during the Carter administration; and was nominated by President Clinton to be the first black woman to head the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice.
In her scholarly writings and in op-ed pieces, she has addressed issues of race, gender, and democratic decision-making, and sought new ways of approaching questions like affirmative action while calling for candid public discourse on these topics.
Deborah Bial is an education strategist who addresses the challenges of college access for underrepresented populations by identifying and fostering latent talent and opening opportunities for them to pursue higher education. Through her Posse Foundation, she offers an alternative model for identifying promising young people from less advantaged, urban environments. Promising students are invited to join a “posse,” a small group that participates in an eight-month, pre-collegiate training program that builds individual and team skills and serves as an essential social support system once students arrive at college.
Dr. Bial has served as the founder and president of the Posse Foundation since 1989. She is also a founding partner of the consulting company Firefly Education LLC. She was a MacArthur Fellow in 2007.