‘A place where ideas about learning will take root and reach the world’

Hundreds gathered to celebrate the dedication of the newly remodeled Stanford Graduate School of Education (GSE) on Nov. 6, marking the culmination of the journey to create a vibrant, state-of-the-art home for education research, teaching, and collaboration at the heart of campus.

At the ceremony, Stanford officially accepted the new buildings into the university, capping years of planning and construction. The project included a sweeping renovation of the historic Education Building built in 1938, renamed the Angela Nomellini & Ken Olivier building (ANKO), which houses a two-story library, new classrooms, and the bright, open forum in which the dedication ceremony took place. The newly constructed Patricia & Jeffrey Raikes building, connected to ANKO by an expansive courtyard, features a dramatic, three-story glass wall and is home to many of the GSE’s classrooms, offices, and research labs. 

“One of the things I find remarkable about these new buildings is how they integrate the past and the present,” said Dan Schwartz, the I. James Quillen Dean of the GSE, noting the “beautiful juxtaposition” of adobe-inspired walls and red-tile roofs with the modern, floor-to-ceiling windows. “It reflects the GSE. We are grounded in the wisdom of the past, but we’re elevated by the boundless possibilities of the future.” 

Stanford President Jonathan Levin and Lily Sarafan, chair of the Stanford Board of Trustees, also shared reflections on the prospective impact of the new spaces during the event, along with doctoral student Melissa Lewis and GSE alum Ryan Duncan, BA ‘24, MA ’24, currently the assistant director of the Native American Cultural Center at Stanford, who honored the Indigenous history of the land originally inhabited by the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe.

Education was one of the founding departments at Stanford in 1891, elevated to a school in 1917. In the university’s original charter, Jane and Leland Stanford sought to “promote the public welfare by exercising an influence on behalf of humanity and civilization,” Sarafan said. “Few parts of Stanford embody that purpose more fully than the Graduate School of Education,” she said, adding that the buildings “form a place where ideas about learning will take root and reach the world.”

Levin spoke to the transformative power of physical spaces that bring students, faculty, and others together in varied and sometimes unexpected ways, giving rise to new connections and insights. 

 “I can’t think of another great university that has located its education school in buildings like this, at the absolute center of the campus,” he said. “These buildings will be transformative, not just for the Graduate School of Education but for all of Stanford University.”