Ph.D., Higher Education & Student Affairs, The Ohio State University

Royel M. Johnson is a nationally-recognized scholar of higher education whose work centers system-impacted students—young people whose lives intersect the foster care, criminal legal, and housing systems—and the conditions that shape belonging, opportunity, and racial equity on college campuses. He is a tenured professor of education and social work at the University of Southern California, where he is a faculty member at the Pullias Center for Higher Education, Co-Editor of Educational Researcher, a leading interdisciplinary journal that shapes national conversations in education research and policy, and Co-Director of the Research Institute for Scholars of Equity (RISE).

Dr. Johnson's research program advances three interconnected strands. First, he examines how institutional policies, practices, and cultural norms shape access to opportunity, belonging, and student success in higher education, particularly for racially minoritized and system-impacted students. Second, he studies racial equity as an institutional and political project—how colleges and universities define, implement, resist, or reconfigure equity initiatives amid shifting policy landscapes and intensifying political backlash. Third, he advances theoretical and methodological tools, including socio-ecological and critical race mixed-methods approaches, for studying marginality in higher education.

He is the author and editor of four books and more than 60 peer-reviewed articles and chapters in leading journals. His sole-authored From Foster Care to College: Navigating Educational Challenges and Creating Possibilities (Teachers College Press) received the 2026 Outstanding Publication Award from the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators, and his forthcoming book The College–Prison Nexus (Harvard Education Press) extends his work on system-impacted students. He is also editor of The Big Lie About Race in America's Schools (Harvard Education Press), winner of the 2026 Society of Professors of Education Outstanding Book Award.

His scholarship has been supported by more than $6.5 million in grants and contracts from federal, state and private funders, including the Institute of Education Sciences, the Spencer Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.

For his contributions to research and practice, Dr. Johnson has received numerous honors, including the 2026 Trueba Award for Research Leading to the Transformation of the Social Contexts of Education from AERA Division G, the 2022 Division G Early Career Award, and the 2022 Outstanding Contribution to Multicultural Education and Research Award from ACPA. He was named a top diversity, equity and inclusion visionary by the Los Angeles Times in both 2023 and 2024.

National and regional media outlets—including The Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed, Newsweek, The Los Angeles Times, and Education Week—regularly seek his expertise. He is also the founding co-host and executive producer of the ASHE Presidential Podcast, which convenes leading scholars on equity, belonging, and the public purposes of higher education. A sought-after speaker and consultant, he works with colleges, universities, K–12 systems, foundations, and nonprofit organizations to translate research into policy and practice.

Dr. Johnson earned a B.A. in political science and an Ed.M. in educational policy studies from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and a Ph.D. in higher education and student affairs, with a cognate in race and social policy, from The Ohio State University.

Expertise
System-impacted students | Sense of belonging | Racial equity in higher education

Extended bio and CV at USC Rossier