Dr. Shelly Meyers Awarded "Impact Academy" Fellowship

Dr. Shelly Meyers, Director of Teacher Education at Limestone College, was recently awarded an Impact Academy fellowship, joining a cohort of fellows chosen for their commitment to improving educator preparation.

Dr. Meyers is also the Chair of Limestone’s Division of Education and Physical Education.

The year-long Impact Academy fellowship aims to accelerate field-wide transformation by supporting and empowering a network of leaders who are committed to improving their educator-preparation programs. Each cohort of fellows is limited to no more than 20 leaders, each of whom went through a rigorous nomination and application process.

“We believe it will be the collective work of leaders like Dr. Meyers who will transform how we prepare future educators,” said Benjamin Riley, founder and executive director of Deans for Impact. “Efforts such as the Impact Academy will nurture and support those leaders as they work to improve their own educator-preparation programs and the field more broadly.”

Deans for Impact is a national non-profit that empowers, supports, and amplifies the voices of leaders in educator preparation. Deans for Impact launched the Impact Academy fellowship in the summer of 2016. The fellows announced recently are the second cohort to participate in the fellowship.

“It is an honor to be selected as a fellow for the second cohort,” Meyers said. “The innovative mindset of my cohort has already helped me think differently about being a leader in educator preparation. I am excited to see how I can use what I am learning to empower the program leaders at Limestone to advance our preparation programs in a way that will positively affect student learning in schools.”

Deans for Impact’s work is grounded in its guiding principles: that educator preparation should be outcomes focused, data informed, empirically tested, transparent, and accountable. Impact Academy fellows are chosen, in part, based on their demonstrated commitment to these guiding principles.

Meyers is one of 17 fellows in the 2017 cohort, who collectively lead programs that enroll more than 7,400 candidates in 13 states and Washington, D.C.

(Accompanying Photo: Dr. Meyers during a recent trip to Washington, DC, on behalf of Limestone College.)