Meet our Head of School

Meet Dr. Meera Viswanathan

Dr. Meera Viswanathan joined Walker’s from Brown University, where she was an Associate Professor of Comparative Literature and East Asian Studies.

A lifelong educator and scholar, Meera holds her undergraduate degree, her M.A., and a Ph.D. from Stanford University. Meera was born in Madras, India and emigrated at age five to Los Angeles.

Meera joined Brown University as a Japan Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow in the Comparative Literature and East Asian Studies departments. Subsequently, she became an assistant professor and was promoted with tenure. Meera, who is fluent in seven languages including French, German, Latin, Classical Greek, Old English, and Old Norse, received several National Endowment for the Humanities grants and awards while at Brown.

Meera and her husband, Dr. Eric Widmer, former head of school at Deerfield Academy, were asked by King Abdullah II of Jordan to establish King’s Academy, the Middle East’s first co-educational college preparatory boarding school with financial aid. The school opened in 2007. Meera served as the school’s principal architect of the curriculum and dean of faculty. King Abdullah II personally awarded Meera the King Hussein Medal, Jordan’s highest honor, for her endeavors.

Meera, or “Ms. Vis” as she’s known to students, began her tenure as head of The Ethel Walker School on July 1, 2016.

Meera on Mountain Day
Meera with Students
Meera Viswanathan Investiture
Meera teaching a class

Meera on Walkerʼs

“Walkerʼs beckoned me in a way that few schools have ever done. I found its ethos, energy, and devotion to learning irresistible. Discovering Walker’s was unexpected and fortuitous, pure serendipity for me.”

Meera on Girls’ Education

“During my decades of teaching at the university level, I encountered many students who had attended a girls’ school. I marveled at their confidence and poise. At Walker’s, I saw wonderfully strong and capable young women with little time for self-doubt.”

Meera on Leadership

“Leadership entails the ability to forge a path, both for oneself and for others. It recognizes that the needs of the group require each individual to assume responsibility for the welfare of the whole at the appropriate time, leading them out and beyond.”

Meera on the Future

“Founded as a standard-bearer of girls’ education in 1911, may Walker’s continue, amid the numerous challenges evident in the world around us, to be a flagship of teaching and learning for young women. May every one of our future hours be golden.”