Paul LeBlanc

Dr. Paul J. LeBlanc is a Visiting Professor at the Harvard University Graduate School of Education. He was the co-founder and Board Chair for Matter and Space, focusing on AI and Education, leaving that role in October of 2025. From 2003 to 2024, he served as President of Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU). Under the 21 years of Paul’s direction, SNHU grew from 2800 students to over 250,000 and is now the largest non-profit provider of online higher education in the country. Paul is considered one of America’s most innovative educators. Forbes Magazine has listed him as one of its 15 “Classroom Revolutionaries” and Washington Monthly named him one of America’s ten most innovative university presidents. In 2012, SNHU was #12 on Fast Company magazine’s “World’s Fifty Most Innovative Companies” list and was the only university included. In 2018, Paul won the prestigious IAA Institute Hesburgh Award for Leadership Excellence in Higher Education, joining some of the most respected university and college presidents in American higher education. In 2024,the University of Pennsylvania awarded him The Zemsky Medal for Innovation in Higher Education. He has also received the Ernest L. Boyer Award (NACU), the Distinguished Alumnus Award (AASCU), and the Ray Schroeder Leadership Award (UPCEA). He has honorary degrees from Coventry University (UK), University Camilo José Cela (Spain), and Westfield State University (US). He is the author of Students First: Equity, Access, and Opportunity in Higher Education (2021), winner of the 2022 Phillip E. Frandson Award for Literature, and Broken: How Our Social Systems Are Failing Us and How We Can Fix Them (2022). His 2015 series of innovation columns for EDUCAUSE Review won an APEX Award for excellent in magazine writing. His newest book is entitled Reclaiming Purpose: The University in an AI World, published by Wiley in July of 2026.