Headshot of Tom J. Shields

Tom J. Shields

Senior Teaching Faculty, Leadership Studies
Curriculum Vitae

  • Profile

    Dr. Tom Shields researches and teaches at the intersection of K-12 education and leadership studies. His popular elective, Education and Equity, focuses on housing-school relationships and segregation. He teaches the Jepson School core courses Historical Foundations of Leadership and Justice and Civil Society. Previously, he taught courses in the University’s undergraduate and graduate education programs, including Foundations of Educational Leadership, Contexts of Educational Politics and Policy, and Education and Public Policy. 

    Shields is an expert on historic and current segregation in K-12 education and housing and its impact on child opportunity. He co-authored a series of reports titled Can We Live & Learn Together and the companion website Learn & Live, all of which examine the education-housing nexus in metro Richmond. Through the University’s Unpacking the Census initiative, he works on disseminating census data about Greater Richmond. 

    He has published articles in School Leadership & Management, Educational Administration Quarterly, Academic Exchange Quarterly, Journal of Black Studies, and Politics and Policy and opinion pieces in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Style Weekly, and Richmond Magazine.  

    Shields was the founding chair of the University's Educational Leadership and Policy Studies Program and the founding director of its Center for Leadership in Education. He served as a visiting international scholar at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Northwestern Switzerland (FHNW) and taught at the Sorensen Institute for Political Leadership at the University of Virginia. 

    Prior to his work in academia, Shields was involved in politics in Virginia. He was one of the first staffers hired by Congressman Bobby Scott, the first African American to be elected to Congress from Virginia since Reconstruction. Shields also ran for the Virginia House of Delegates.

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    • Awards

      Distinguished Faculty Service Award, University of Richmond, 2025

      Community-engaged Scholarship Award, Bonner Center for Civic Engagement, University of Richmond, 2024

      Distinguished Educator Award, University of Richmond, 2014

  • Selected Publications
    Journal Articles

    Siegel-Hawley, G., Bridges, K., & Shields, T. (2017). A false choice: Diversity and equity versus savings and re-segregation in an urban school system. Educational Administration Quarterly, 52(1), 107-141.

    Shields, T., & Cassada, K. (2016). Context or sponsored mobility? Access and outcomes by race, ethnicity, and gender of participants in a regional leadership development program. School Leadership & Management, 36(3), 1-20.

    Shields, T., Cassada, K., & Shakeshaft, C. (2012). EduLead: Regional partnership for regional benefit. Virginia Educational Leadership, 9(1) 44-60.

    Shields, T., Kidd, Q., Johnson, R., & O'Brien, S. (2006). Civic and political leadership. Academic Exchange Quarterly, 10(2), 77+.

    Shields, T. (2004). The fight for political representation in a Southern suburb: The use of the Voting Rights Act and the federal court system by Black plaintiffs in Henrico County, Virginia. Politics and Policy, (32)2, 222-47.

    Shields, T. (2003). The “Tip of the Iceberg” in a Southern suburban county: The fight for a Martin Luther King, Jr., holiday. Journal of Black Studies, 33(4), 499-519.

    Book Chapters

    Shields, T. & Cassada, K. (2020). Immigration and refugee policies in the United States: School leaders and the choice of ethics or compliance. In K. Bezio & A. Goethals (Eds.), Leadership, Populism, and Resistance (pp. 176-195). Edward Elgar Publishing.

    Additional Publications

    Siegel-Hawley, G., Shields, T., and Bridges, K. (2022, September). What Virginia’s Executive Order 1 and subsequent reports mean for Virginia’s K12 school leaders, students, families & other stakeholders.

    Shields, T., & Murtaugh, S. (2021, November). Unpacking the Census report.

    Siegel-Hawley, G., Shields, T., Bridges, K., & Koziol, B. (2019, October). Window of opportunity: Creating more integrated schools in a segregated system.

    Siegel-Hawley, G., Koziol, B., Moeser, J., Holden, T., & Shields, T. (2017). Can we live and learn together? Confronting school and housing segregation in the Richmond region. Report of the University of Richmond Center for Leadership in Education, the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Education, and Housing Opportunities Made Equal (HOME) of Virginia. http://school-diversity.org/pdf/Richmond_Housing-Schools_Report_2017.pdf

    Films

    Shields, T. & Tulowitzki, P. (2021). Leadership and management. Created as part of German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) grant.

    Shields, T. & Tulowitzki, P. (2020). What is leadership? Created as part of German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) grant.

  • In the News

    John Mercer Langston Paved the Way for Black U.S. Representatives, But Most People Don’t Know It
    Tue., Jul. 11, 2023

    Commentary: By mapping Richmond's past and present, our future comes into focus
    Sun., Apr. 30, 2023

    Column: Schools have a moral (and legal) obligation to resist ‘divisive concepts’ ban
    Sat., Dec. 3, 2022

    Tom Shields and Karen Kochel column: Diverse friendships: an unexpected benefit of controversial school rezoning
    Sat., Feb. 1, 2020