MLA Information Session

Seth Green is the dean of the Graham School of Continuing Liberal and Professional Studies at the University of Chicago. Under his leadership, the school has grown more than fourfold, strengthened its storied tradition in the lifelong liberal arts, and built new programs in advanced leadership.

Before joining UChicago, Green served as founding director of the Baumhart Center for Social Enterprise and Responsibility at Loyola University Chicago. During his tenure, the Center launched a top-ranked specialty MBA program, a nationally significant award for social innovation in business, and an array of educational programs and events that annually engaged more than 4,000 learners. Green also served as an executive lecturer in Loyola’s Quinlan School of Business, receiving recognition as the Mission-Driven Faculty Member of the Year in 2021.

Prior to Loyola, Green led Youth & Opportunity United (Y.O.U.), a nonprofit organization that prepares low-income youth for post-secondary and life success. At Y.O.U., Green oversaw nearly fourfold growth in youth served and a $16.4 million fundraising campaign to build a state-of-the-art youth center. He also spearheaded two strategic planning processes, resulting in an enhanced program model and deepened impact. Alongside Y.O.U., Green taught courses on nonprofit management as an adjunct lecturer at Northwestern University.

Earlier in his career, Green worked as a consultant at McKinsey & Company, guiding private sector clients through strategy development and change management. A recipient of McKinsey’s Community Fellowship, he spent one year of his time at the firm supporting nonprofit clients, including the Gates Foundation and United Way.

Green speaks and writes on social innovation. His commentaries and research have appeared in the Christian Science Monitor, Fortune Magazine, the Journal of Business Research, and the Social Innovations Journal, and he previously served on the Editorial Review Board of the Business and Society Review. Green has been a featured guest on Slate Podcasts, C-SPAN’s Washington Journal, MSNBC, and CNN, and his efforts have been covered by The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Chronicle of Higher Education. In 2008, Utne Reader named him one of 50 “Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World.”

Green’s civic service centers on education, the arts, and public-interest research. He serves on the boards of NORC, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, North Shore Country Day School, and the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, and on the Membership Committee of the Economic Club of Chicago. He has previously served on the Campaign Cabinet of the United Way of Metro Chicago, the Impact Investing Advisory Council of the YWCA Metropolitan Chicago, the Advisory Board of Concordia Place, and the Advisory Board of the Executives’ Club of Chicago.

A Marshall Scholar, Green holds a JD from Yale University, a master’s in women’s studies from Oxford University, a master’s in development studies from the London School of Economics, and a bachelor’s degree in politics from Princeton University.

Tim Murphy serves as Director of the Master Liberal Arts program and has been with the Graham School since 2015. A lifelong Chicagoan, Tim completed his undergraduate studies at UChicago studying American history and later earned his MA here focused on twentieth-century American political history. You can contact Tim at timmurphy@uchicago.edu.

In his spare time, he enjoys taking advantage of the tremendous resources available through UChicago’s library, pursuing a hodgepodge of historical interests.

Nicole Watts (she/her) is the Assistant Director of Graduate Programs at the Graham School. In this role, she helps manage outreach and advising for the Graham School’s educational programming, specifically serving as the lead advisor to students in the Master of Liberal Arts program within the Graham School. You can reach Nicole at nicolewatts@uchicago.edu.

While originally from New York, Nicole pursued the majority of her education in North Carolina; she holds a B.A. in French and an M.Ed. in Educational Leadership from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, as well as an M.Sc. in History from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. Nicole’s dissertation focused on internal Orientalism and representations of the American South in popular media of the late twentieth century, although she is perennially interested in all research that explores the role of media in national myth-making.

In her free time, Nicole can often be found haunting antique malls and desperately trying to teach herself how to create mixed media collages. She’s extremely passionate about Chicago architecture (especially American Foursquares!), and she enjoys stumbling across new neighborhoods and hot dog joints.