Grayling resigned from Birkbeck in June 2011 to found and become the first master of New College of the Humanities, an independent undergraduate college in London. In February 2019, Northeastern University, a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts, USA, purchased the New College of the Humanities. He is a Supernumerary Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford. He was a judge on the Man Booker prize 2003 and Chairman of the Judges for the 2014 Man Booker Prize. He has also been a judge on the Wellcome Trust Book Prize and the Art Fund prize.