 Thereafter, Spadafora returned to Yale, as a residential college dean and lecturer in the history department.He was acting dean of Morse College (1982) and dean of Calhoun College (1982–85), and then became associate dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (1985–90).His book, "The Idea of Progress in Eighteenth-Century Britain", was published by Yale University Press in 1990, and was included in the Outstanding Academic Books List by "Choice", a publication of the Association of College and Research Libraries.