Tufts Names Lili Palacios-Baldwin General Counsel

Lili Palacios-Baldwin, a widely respected attorney experienced in the legal issues surrounding higher education with deep and far-ranging experience at Tufts, has been named vice president and general counsel for the university.

Palacios-Baldwin currently serves as deputy general counsel for labor, employment, and dispute resolution for the university. She will succeed Mary Jeka, who will retire in June after 23 years of leadership at Tufts.

In her new role, Palacios-Baldwin will serve as the university's chief legal officer and will lead the offices of University Counsel, University Compliance and Ethics, and Equal Opportunity. Palacios-Baldwin will report to Tufts University President Sunil Kumar.

In his email announcing the appointment, Kumar noted that in advising him and other university leaders, Palacios-Baldwin "showed an exceptional grasp of the law in handling these issues, exercised sound judgment, and presented a clear and pragmatic approach to resolving them."

"Lili's advice is always thoughtful, measured, and with a firm commitment to the mission of the university," Kumar said.

Palacios-Baldwin cites the transformative power of education in her own and her family's life as part of her motivation for assuming this role. "Education was the key that opened that door for my parents when we came to the U.S. from Venezuela in the 1970s, and it has been a value I've instilled in my own family," she said.

"The opportunity now to continue to represent and protect Tufts University and its mission of transforming lives and improving society while also acting in a leadership role more broadly supportive of that mission feels meant to be," said Palacios-Baldwin.

Palacios-Baldwin also took the opportunity to express gratitude for Jeka. "Mary is a legend and stateswoman in higher education circles for her legal and political acumen, for her ability to stand up fearlessly on issues of importance, and for bridging differences on complex issues," she said. "It has truly been a blessing to have had a front-row seat to her work at Tufts during my time at the university."

Palacios-Baldwin joined Tufts University's Office of General Counsel in 2013. In her current role, she has guided the university in a wide range of areas, including employment and labor matters, litigation and other disputes, research compliance, and equal opportunity compliance at the federal, state and local levels.

Prior to joining Tufts, Palacios-Baldwin began her legal career at Robinson and Cole LLP, where she practiced in the areas of land use, real estate, and labor and employment law. She later served as a trial attorney at the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) for almost 10 years, the last few as a senior trial attorney. At the EEOC, she litigated individual and class-action cases within the federal courts, conducted training and public presentations, and worked with federal investigators on both enforcement and litigation matters throughout New England, New York, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.

After leaving the EEOC, Palacios-Baldwin continued her law practice with Hirsch Roberts Weinstein LLP, a labor, employment, and litigation firm with a higher education focus.

In 2020, Palacios-Baldwin was honored by Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly as one of the Top Women of Law. In the same year, the National Association of College and University Attorneys (NACUA) recognized her with the First Decade Award, which salutes an early-career member who has provided outstanding service to the association and to the practice of higher education law. This year, Palacios-Baldwin was selected as a recipient of the NACUA Distinguished Service Award for her extraordinary service to the association and to institutions of higher learning over an extended period of time.

In addition to longtime service to NACUA, Palacios-Baldwin has been active in other community and professional organizations throughout her career. She has served as a volunteer for Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts of Massachusetts, which offers pro bono and reduced-fee legal services and educational programs to artists and cultural organizations across the Bay State. She has been a board member for Breakthrough Greater Boston, and she has been a member of the board of advisors for both GBH and the National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining. She has also served as an elected member of the Boston Bar Association's Council and co-chair of the BBA's higher education section.

Palacios-Baldwin earned a J.D. from Northeastern University School of Law and a bachelor's degree in international studies from Johns Hopkins University. She is also a graduate of the Kripalu Schools of Yoga and Ayurveda, through which she was certified as a Kripalu Ayurvedic yoga teacher.