Her Story
About Tara
I have been in education for 24 years, with 14 of those years in higher education. I currently serve as the Associate Dean in the School of Education at IU Kokomo, a regional campus for Indiana University. This is my fifth year in a leadership role - I started as Associate Assistant Dean and have been serving as Associate Dean for the last three years. Under my leadership, we have grown programs on campus by 40%, focusing on expanding the teacher pipeline and pathways while rethinking the traditional teacher workforce. I have created innovative programs for working adults, particularly paraprofessionals who are already working in communities but don't have bachelor's degrees, allowing them to do on-the-job learning while completing their degrees. This program now represents about 33% of our full enrollment. We are expanding into apprenticeship models with funding attached for districts and developing pre-apprenticeship programs for high school students, connecting them to paid on-the-job experience. Before moving into administration, I was an elementary teacher who taught 5th grade for 10 years. After my first year of teaching, I went back to get my master's degree because I felt I wasn't ready to stop learning, and then pursued my doctorate to expand my impact as far as possible. I study gamification and have developed a reputation as a leader in gamification and education across the nation. I received a presidential award as a professor, which was one award across all IU campuses, for showcasing evidence of impact on learning. I come from a family of educators - my mom taught for 43 years, my dad for 38 years, my grandmother was a kindergarten teacher during World War II, and my brother and uncle also have teaching degrees.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Tara
01What do you attribute your success to?
I attribute my success to always wanting to expand my impact as far as possible. As a teacher, you can impact your students, but when you're a professor, you can impact future teachers who then impact their students - that ripple effect. And now, as a leader, I'm looking to impact all of my instructors who can then impact their students. I think about taking my impact as far of a reach as possible. It's important to me to grow the profession and build strong educators. I'm constantly upskilling and always looking at what's next, whether that's student motivation, retention, or enrollment. I dig into what's been done and try to problem solve and think innovatively about how we can do things better or different to really make an impact. I also believe in forward-thinking - we started our innovative teacher training programs back in 2022 because we didn't want to wait for the shoes to drop before changing the way we train teachers. It takes a lot of work partnering with stakeholders and those in the districts, meeting with lots of people to bring those partnerships close together and getting district buy-in.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
I would say congratulations, we need good educators, and if you know that's your path, you're a lucky person. You get to wake up every day knowing that you're doing the work that you're meant to do, and it's very rewarding work. First, just honor that it is a calling and that it's a need - we need good teachers. But I think the most important thing to change in the field is the positive message around being a teacher. The narrative people are getting across the nation is that if you're a teacher, you're stuck as a teacher, you can't grow out of it, it's hard work, you don't get paid enough - and that's really not the narrative. You don't have to stay a teacher. If you become a teacher, you can become an administrator, you can go into higher ed, you can be a school psychologist, you can be a counselor - all these different pathways, all these doors that can open up with an education degree. That narrative's not sold, and I want to sell the right narrative about the opportunities that education can provide, a degree in education. Don't limit yourself just thinking this means you're going to be a teacher for 42 years like my mom was. There are other pathways that it can lead to that are equally as exciting. This is a profession that is going to add a lot of value to your life and a lot of impact to the students that you serve in the future.
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