Dr. Tia Brown McNair is a nationally recognized leader on inclusive excellence, high-impact practices, student readiness, equity in student outcomes, and campus climate. Her work focuses on helping colleges and universities create learning environments where all students can thrive and where institutional change is guided by evidence, accountability, and a deep commitment to diversity and student belonging. Through her scholarship, facilitation, and national engagement, McNair has advanced conversations and strategies that support student access and success, institutional transformation, racial healing, and the democratic purpose of higher education. She is the co-author of Becoming a Student-Ready College: A New Culture of Leadership for Student Success, From Equity Talk to Equity Walk: Expanding Practitioner Knowledge for Racial Justice in Higher Education, and the editor of Strengthening Campus Communities Through the Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation Framework. Her contributions have been recognized with the Facilitator Award (2025) at Stetson Law’s Annual National Conference on Law and Higher Education, NASPA’s Outstanding Contribution to Higher Education Award (2024), an honorary degree in 2023 from Franklin Pierce University for her national work to dismantle a false belief in a hierarchy of human value, and Diverse: Issues in Higher Education (now The EDULedger) in 2020 as one of thirty-five outstanding women who have tackled some of higher education’s toughest challenges, exhibited extraordinary leadership skills, and made a positive difference in their communities.

McNair earned her bachelor’s degree in political science and English at James Madison University and holds an M.A. in English from Radford University and a doctorate in higher education administration from George Washington University.