List of San Francisco State University people

Music

• Annette A. Aguilar – percussionist, bandleader, and music educator
• Vernon Alley (1915–2004) – jazz bassist
• Mike Burkett – lead singer of NOFX
• Dan the Automator – hip-hop producer
• Paul Desmond (1924–1977) – jazz musician, member of The Dave Brubeck Quartet and composer of "Take Five"
• George Duke (1946–2013) – musician and producer
• Don Falcone – musician and producer
• Jennifer Finch – bass player for the rock band L7
• Paul Gemignani – Broadway musical director
• Noah Georgeson – musician and producer
• Vince Guaraldi (1928–1976) – jazz musician and composer of the Peanuts cartoon music
• Kirk Hammett – Metallica's lead guitarist
• Dan Hicks (1941–2016) – musician, member of The Charlatans, leader of Dan Hicks and His Hot Licks
• Ella Jenkins – folk singer
• Johnny Mathis – singer
• Dean Menta – composer, guitarist for Faith No More and Sparks
• Steven Miller – producer, arranger, and record company executive
• Kent Nagano – conductor
• Pauline Oliveros (1932–2016) – composer, accordionist and electronic art musician
• John Patitucci – jazz double bass and jazz fusion electric bass player
• Terry Riley – composer
• Pete Rugolo (1915–2011) – jazz composer, arranger and record producer
• Ghazi Shami – record producer and music technologist, founder & CEO of Empire Distribution
• Cal Tjader (1925–1982) – jazz musician
• Oliver Tree – surrealist musician, singer, songwriter, comedian, and filmmaker
• Joe Louis Walker – electric blues guitarist, singer, songwriter and producer
• Janet Weiss – drummer for Sleater-Kinney

Politics and government

• Tom Ammiano – member of the California State Assembly (13th district)
• Herman Bottcher (1909–1944) – decorated U.S. Army soldier, veteran of the Spanish Civil War and World War II
• Barbara Brannon – major general, United States Air Force
• Willie Brown – member and 58th Speaker of the California State Assembly and former mayor of San Francisco, California
• John L. Burton – former president pro tempore of the California State Senate
• Robert Campbell – member of the California State Assembly (1980–1996)
• Roscoe Cartwright (1919–1974) – first black field artilleryman promoted to brigadier general
• Ron Dellums (1935–2018) – former mayor of Oakland and U.S. representative 1971–1998
• Saeb Erekat – Palestinian chief of the PLO Steering and Monitoring Committee
• Heather Fong – former chief of police, San Francisco Police Department
• Larry Galizio – member of the Oregon House of Representatives
• Mike Gierau – member of the Wyoming Senate
• Patsy Jo Hilliard – educator and former mayor of East Point, Georgia
• Darlene Iskra – first woman to command a U.S. Navy ship
• Ed Jew – politician
• Cleve Jones – AIDS and LGBT rights activist
• Keith Kerr – military general and gay rights activist
• Fred H. Lau – former chief of police, San Francisco Police Department
• Nicole LeFavour – Idaho state senator
• Wilma Mankiller (1945–2010) – first woman elected to serve as chief of the Cherokee Nation
• John Márquez – politician
• George Miller – U.S. congressman, 1975–2015
• Richard Oakes (1942–1972) – Native American activist
• William Wayne Paul (1939–1989) – political activist, photographer and martial artist
• Nemesio Prudente (1927–2008) – political activist and president of the Polytechnic University of the Philippines
• Pierre Salinger (1925–2004) – White House press secretary for JFK and LBJ
• Harpreet Sandhu – Richmond, California politician and Sikh community leader
• Mario Savio (1942–1996) – political activist, key member in the Berkeley Free Speech Movement
• David Schuman – judge of the Oregon Court of Appeals
• Mu Sochua – Cambodian member of Parliament and women's rights activist
• Bill Thomas – former congressman and chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee
• Leland Yee – California state senator
• Mohammad Javad Zarif – Iranian Foreign Minister

Science and technology

• R. Paul Butler – astronomer
• Yvonne Cagle – NASA astronaut
• Douglas Crockford – programmer, specifier of JSON, JavaScript language developer
• Hillman Curtis (1961–2012) – pioneering web designer
• Debra Fischer – astronomy professor, Yale University
• Gerta Keller – paleontologist, professor of Geosciences at Princeton University
• Gilman Louie – technologist, venture capitalist, game designer; former CEO of Spectrum HoloByte, Inc., In-Q-Tel; chairman of the Federation of American Scientists
• Stanley Mazor – co-inventor of the microprocessor
• Amalia Mesa-Bains – psychologist and artist
• Sophie Molholm – neuroscientist and academic, Albert Einstein College of Medicine
• Alison Murray – biochemist and Antarctic researcher
• Dan Werthimer – co-founder and chief scientist of SETI@home
• Joseph White (1932–2017) – psychologist, "godfather of Black psychology"

Sports

• Kevin Anderson – athletic director for the University of Maryland, College Park
• Billy Baird – New York Jets player (1963–1969) and coach (1981–1984)
• Bebe Bryans – United States and Olympic head coach in women's rowing
• Ken Carter – education activist and former high school basketball coach
• Paul Cayard – professional sailor
• Elmer Collett – NFL player, 1967–1977
• Ali Dia – professional soccer player
• Pete Dominguez – assistant coach for Milwaukee Bucks of NBA
• Frank Duncan – NFL player, 1979–1981
• Maury Duncan – NFL and CFL player, 1954–1958
• Esmé Emmanuel (born 1947) – South African tennis player
• Tommy Harper – MLB player, 1962–1976
• Bud Harrelson – MLB player, 1965–1980
• Mike Holmgren – SFSU football coach; later NFL coach and executive, 1986–2012
• Joe Jackson – American football player
• Carl Kammerer – NFL player, 1961–1969
• Gilbert Melendez – professional mixed martial artist, former World Extreme Cagefighting and Strikeforce Lightweight Champion, UFC lightweight contender
• Floyd Peters (1936–2008) – NFL player (1958–1970) and coach (1974–1996)
• Jake Shields – professional mixed martial artist, former Strikeforce Middleweight Champion, and formerly competing for the UFC
• Jim Sochor (1938–2015) – football player and coach
• Jesse Taylor (attended) – wrestler, mixed martial arts fighter
• Bob Toledo – football player and coach

Other

• Mahyar Amouzegar – mathematician, engineer, policy analyst, author, and academic
• Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz – professor emerita of Ethnic Studies at California State University, East Bay
• Vester Lee Flanagan II (1973–2015) – gunman in the deaths of two U.S. journalists
• Lee Francis (1945–2003) – poet, educator, and founder of the Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers
• Eva Galperin – director of cybersecurity at the Electronic Frontier Foundation
• Stephen Gaskin (1935–2014) – author, teacher, public speaker, political activist, and philanthropic organizer
• Aidan Kelly – academic, poet and influential figure in the Neopagan religion of Wicca
• Chandra Levy (1977–2001) – intern; murdered in 2001 in Washington, D.C.
• Jaime Levy – interface designer and user experience strategist
• Ruth B. Love – former superintendent of the Oakland Unified School District and Chicago Public Schools
• Marianne O'Grady – deputy country director Afghanistan with Care International, during Fall of Kabul (2021)
• James Van Praagh – self-proclaimed medium, recipient of the 2012 Pigasus Award in the category "Refusal to face reality"
• Alice Fong Yu (1905–2000) – first Chinese American public school teacher in California

Notable current and past faculty

• Craig Abaya – artist
• Rabab Abdulhadi (born 1955) – Palestinian-born American scholar, activist, educator, editor, and an academic director
• Kim Addonizio – poet, novelist
• Herbert Blau (1926–2013) – theater director, co-director of the San Francisco Actor's Workshop, 1953–1965
• Wilmette Brown – teacher in SFSU's first Black Studies department
• Zita Cabello-Barrueto – professor, activist
• Jeffery Paul Chan – professor of Asian American studies and English
• Philip Choy (1926–2017) – historian
• Larry Clark – member of L.A. Rebellion School of Black Filmmakers
• Walter Van Tilburg Clark – founder of the Creative Writing program; author of The Ox-Bow Incident
• John Collier Jr. (1913–1992) – anthropologist
• August Coppola (1936–2009) – dean of Creative Arts
• Sachi Cunningham – PBS Frontline/world producer and director of photography, Los Angeles Times video journalist, journalism professor
• Angela Davis (born 1944) – professor of ethnic studies
• Victor De La Rosa – class of 1999, professor of fine art
• Roland De Wolk – journalist, Pulitzer Prize winner
• Marc Dollinger – professor of Jewish studies
• Richard Dugdale – oceanographer and fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science
• Richard Festinger – composer
• Bennett Friedman – musician, saxophonist
• Gloria Frym – poet, fiction writer, and essayist
• Sally Miller Gearhart – feminist, science fiction writer, and political activist
• Vartan Gregorian – former professor, president of Carnegie Corporation of New York
• John Gutmann (1905–1998) – photographer
• Milton Halberstadt (1919–2000) – photographer, artist
• John Handy – jazz musician
• Nathan Hare – first coordinator of black studies, founding publisher of The Black Scholar, sociologist, psychologist
• S. I. Hayakawa (1906–1992) – former SFSU president, and U.S. senator
• Paul Hoover – poet
• Ralf Hotchkiss – Distinguished Research Scientist in the Department of Engineering
• Jules Irving (1925–1979) – actor, director, co-director of the San Francisco Actors' Workshop, 1953–1965, and artistic director of the Repertory Company of Lincoln Center, NYC
• John Keith Irwin (1929–2010) – professor of sociology
• Russell Jeung – professor of sociology, co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate
• Persis Karim (b. 1962) – poet, editor, the Neda Nobari Distinguished Chair and director of the Center for Iranian Diaspora Studies
• Luis Kemnitzer (1928–2006) – anthropologist, political activist
• Dean H. Kenyon – professor emeritus of Biology, author of Of Pandas and People, one of the main proponents of intelligent design
• Michael Krasny – professor of English
• Catherine Kudlick – professor of history, director of the Paul K. Longmore Institute on Disability
• David Kuraoka – ceramic artist
• Bruce A. Manning – professor of chemistry and biochemistry
• Eric Mar – lecturer on Asian American Studies, politician, member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors
• Geoff Marcy – astronomer, discoverer of more than 150 extrasolar planets
• David Matsumoto – psychologist
• Joseph McBride – author and film historian
• Dave McElhatton (1928–2010) – journalist, evening news anchor
• Sandra Lee McKay – linguist
• Jan Millsapps – writer, filmmaker
• Mahmood Monshipouri (born 1952) – scholar, author, educator
• Wright Morris (1910–1998) – novelist and photographer, professor of English (1962–1975)
• Alejandro Murguía – San Francisco Poet Laureate (2012)
• Pete Najarian – writer
• Jacob Needleman – philosopher of religion
• Bill Nichols – professor emeritus in the Cinema Department
• Roger Nixon (1921–2009) – composer, musician
• Peter Orner – writer
• Wayne Peterson – composer, Pulitzer Prize winner
• Stan Rice (1942–2002) – professor of English and creative writing
• Moses Rischin – historian
• Stephen Rodefer (1940–2015) – poet
• Theodore Roszak (1933–2011) – historian, author of The Making of a Counter Culture
• Vic Rowen (1919–2013) – football player and coach
• Carol Lee Sanchez – poet, visual artist, essayist
• Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez (1964–) – composer
• Irving Saraf (1932–2012) – Academy Award-winning film director and producer, former professor of film production
• James Schevill (1920–2009) – poet, critic, and playwright
• Doug Siebum – professional audio engineer
• Anita Silvers – (1940–2019) – philosopher of science, disability rights activist
• Nick Sousanis – cartoonist
• Askia M. Touré – poet, professor, and activist associated with the Black Arts Movement
• Bas van Fraassen – Philosopher of Science, Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at SFSU, fellow of the British Academy, and fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
• Sylvia Solochek Walters – professor emeritus of Art, artist and printmaker
• Carleton Washburne (1889–1968) – author and educational reformer
• Roger Woodward – pianist

Presidents

• Frederic Lister Burk (1899–1924)
• Archibald B. Anderson (1924–1927)
• Mary A. Ward (Acting President, 1927)
• Alexander C. Roberts (1927–1945)
• J. Paul Leonard (1945–1957)
• Glenn Dumke (1957–1961)
• Frank L. Fenton (1961–1962)
• Paul A. Dodd (1962–1965)
• Stanley F. Paulson (1965–1966)
• John Summerskill (1966–1968)
• Robert R. Smith (1968)
• S. I. Hayakawa (1968–1973)
• Paul F. Romberg (1973–1983)
• Chia-Wei Woo (1983–1988)
• Robert A. Corrigan (1988–2012)
• Leslie Wong (2012–2019)
• Lynn Mahoney (2019–present)

References