Ramona Meraz Lewis

Dr. Lewis (she/her) is a master faculty specialist in the Department of Educational Leadership, Research, and Technology in the College of Education and Human Development at Western Michigan University. Dr. Lewis is an alumna of the State of Michigan King Chavez Parks Future Faculty Fellow program.

Currently, serving as the director of the Office of Faculty Development, supporting the professional enhancement and advancement of faculty, instructors, and teaching assistants across career stages and disciplines. Dr. Lewis brings extensive theoretical and applied experience in adult learning, grounded in her doctoral cognate in older adult learning and reinforced by years of teaching across multiple modalities and institutional contexts. Her doctoral work included a research assistantship in a faculty development center, where she collaborated on scholarship of teaching and learning projects with faculty across disciplines. Her scholarly approach to adult development informs her faculty development practice, recognizing faculty as adult learners who are constantly adapting to their own changing educational environments. She was awarded the College of Education & Human Development, Mary L Dawson Teaching Excellence award and has engaged in numerous pedagogically focused seminars and trainings. 

Dr. Lewis is a proud practitioner-scholar, beginning her career in higher education as an administrator, she utilizes that experience to guide her leadership approaches, scholarship, and work with students. Before joining WMU in 2012, Dr. Lewis served in academic and student affairs roles at multiple institutions across the U.S., including positions in academic advising, academic support services, first-year experience, new student programs, and campus life. . 

Dr. Lewis also advises and teaches in the Educational Leadership unit, working with both Ph.D. and master’s students. Dr. Lewis teaches courses and serves on doctoral dissertation committees and undergraduate honors theses related to higher education, student affairs, and educational leadership.  For 10 years, she led the graduate program in higher education and student affairs leadership (HESA). Lewis previously held a joint appointment in the WMU Graduate College as the first faculty director of graduate student success, overseeing a variety of initiatives focused on graduate students’ holistic well-being and academic success. 

Dr. Lewis’s work as a faculty member centers on teaching and supporting undergraduate and graduate students in exploring leadership in higher education. Classes taught include: foundations of higher education and student affairs, college environments, intervention skills, global perspectives in higher education, adult learning, qualitative research, as well as the supervision of more than 200 student field and capstone experiences. She also helped in developing the curriculum for the undergraduate minor in leadership for social change. 

Dr. Lewis serves on the editorial board for the Mid-Western Educational Researcher (MWER), and she is an Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) Qualified Administrator. 

Highlights from Experience Driven Learning & Global Engagement Work

Dr. Lewis is passionate about experience-based learning, particularly in creating global learning opportunities for graduate and undergraduate students. She supports the global engagement mission of the WMU Seita Scholars Program, a comprehensive support initiative for college students with lived experience in foster care, and developed the CEHD 3050: Seita Scholars study abroad program. Demonstrating commitment, Dr. Lewis launched an international exchange initiative with the University of Toronto. She won the 2023 Best Practices in International Education Award from the NASPA International Education Knowledge Community for her Global Classrooms Initiative. She was selected as one of nine faculty members nationwide for the Forum on Education Abroad's inaugural Global Learning Launchpad cohort in 2023, served on the Fulbright Specialist Roster from 2018 to 2023, and received a CIEE International Faculty Development Seminar scholarship to attend "Grow Abroad: Enhancing Study Away Through Online Learning" in London, England.