Board Staff

Dr. Kate Shaw serves as the Executive Director of Pennsylvania’s newly-created State Board of Higher Education (SBHE).  In this position, she provides leadership, expertise and support to the Board as it charts a new course for higher education in Pennsylvania that that will enable the sector to serve as a primary engine of workforce and economic development by providing accessible and affordable pathways to postsecondary credentials that are central to a prosperous Pennsylvania.

Dr. Shaw served as Deputy Secretary and Commissioner for Postsecondary Education at the Pennsylvania Department of Education for nearly two years immediately prior to her appointment as the Executive Director of the SBHE.  During that time she led efforts on behalf of Governor Josh Shapiro to craft a bold new vision for higher education focused on affordability, access, and accountability.  Dr. Shaw’s efforts to engage an extensive array of leaders from multiple sectors—higher education, the business and employment sector, labor, legislators, county and city officials, and state and national higher education experts--contributed to broad, bipartisan support for Governor Shapiro’s historic package of higher education legislation which was passed into law in July 2024.  This includes over $140 million in additional support for students, over $55 million in new appropriations to publicly-funded colleges and universities, and the creation of the new State Board of Higher Education.

Dr. Shaw’s career in higher education policy spans over three decades, during which time she has led large-scale studies of major postsecondary policies and reforms as Executive Director of Research for Action, and has worked directly with state policymakers via her role as Senior Advisor at HCM Strategists, a national policy development firm that partners with more than two dozen states to strengthen their postsecondary systems, their finances, and their capacity to serve as economic and workforce development engines.   She currently serves on the Executive Committee of the national organization of State Higher Education Executive Officers.

She previously served as Deputy Secretary for Postsecondary and Higher Education in the administration of Governor Ed Rendell, where she oversaw the implementation of a wide range of policy initiatives. Shaw was also previously a faculty member at Temple University for a decade, where she was tenured and served as the Chair of the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies.  She was elected twice to the Board of the West Chester Area School District. 

Dr. Shaw received her undergraduate degree from Colby College and her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan.

Lubna Mian is the Chief of Staff to the State Board of Higher Education.  She is a lawyer and an expert on higher education, civil rights, and nonprofit law and governance.  She obtained a B.A. from Vassar College and her J.D. from Penn Carey Law, where for many years she has taught a course on higher education law and policy.  She worked for fourteen years as a university administrator in the Office of the Provost at the University of Pennsylvania.  In her private consulting practice, she has been an expert on cases of national significance and an advisor on issues relating to employment and university issues.  In the early part of her career she was a litigator with three well regarded law firms in New York and Philadelphia. She is a Board member at the Gender Justice Fund, a member of the Chairman’s Council for the Mann Music Center, and on the Advisory Board for Pennsylvanians for Modern Courts.