Brian Boyd is the William C. Friday Professor of Education in the School of Education and Director of the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He was previously the Director of the Juniper Gardens Children’s Project at the University of Kansas. Prior to Kansas, Boyd spent nearly a decade as a faculty member in the UNC Department of Allied Health Sciences, earning tenure and holding research appointments at the Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities and FPG.

Boyd is quite engaged in research that involves the most vulnerable, and often marginalized, populations. As a special educator by training, much of his research has involved the development and evaluation of evidence-based practices that could be implemented within school and home contexts. His more recent work has focused on how issues of implicit bias and race affect the outcomes of children with and without disabilities. Boyd’s research has been continuously funded by federal agencies such as the Institute of Education Sciences and National Institutes of Health. Currently, Boyd serves on the Board of Directors of the International Society for Autism Research (INSAR) as the incoming president-elect. He also serves on multiple national boards that are dedicated to improving the outcomes of autistic persons and those from historically underserved communities.