Heritage University advances student success and faculty excellence through new leadership appointments

TOPPENISH, Wash. — Heritage University President Dr. Chris Gilmer has announced the appointment of two educational leaders who will play key roles in advancing research and best practices for strengthening students’ success and teaching excellence.

Dr. Latara Lampkin has been appointed director of the Ross Institute for Student Success, and Dr. Gloria Jones-Dance has been appointed director of the Center for Intercultural Learning and Teaching (CILT). Together, the appointments position Heritage to build on its longstanding commitment to serving first-generation, rural and historically underserved students while enhancing faculty development and expanding the university’s national profile in higher education research.

The appointments reflect Heritage’s strategic focus on leveraging its expertise in serving “New Majority” students and sharing those proven practices, internally and with educators and institutions across the country.

Advancing Research and Innovation Through the Ross Institute

According to Dr. Kathleen Ross, founding president and President Emerita at Heritage University after whom the institute is named, the Ross Institute will help take to national scale the teaching methodologies on which Heritage has built its reputation. “We have built a model that is successful for first-generation, rural students and for students who have been historically underserved in many ways. The Ross Center will expand its efforts to share our research and best practices by supporting and collaborating with other colleges and universities nationally in their efforts to help students from similar backgrounds succeed,” said Dr. Ross.

As director of the Ross Institute for Student Success, Dr. Lampkin will lead Heritage’s efforts to research and promote effective practices for serving “New Majority” students—first-generation, low-income and historically underrepresented learners who make up nearly the entire Heritage student population.

Located on the Heritage campus, the institute supports faculty in enhancing teaching practices, conducts research into successful student-centered approaches, and welcomes visiting scholars whose work contributes to the advancement of educational excellence. The institute builds upon decades of pioneering work in this field by Dr. Ross and others at Heritage and has attracted significant philanthropic support, including a $1 million leadership gift from Jim and Gaye Pigott dedicated to its continued growth.

Lampkin brings extensive experience in educational research, policy and collaborative partnerships. She recently served as Senior Research Associate at the Florida Center for Reading Research at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida, where she led research, training, and dissemination initiatives focused on research knowledge and utilization, policy implementation for systems changes, educator pathways and development, and  student success. Prior to joining the faculty at FSU, Lampkin served as a research associate with the National Center for Scaling Up Effective Schools and an assistant professor at the University of North Florida, respectively.

A widely published scholar, Lampkin’s work has appeared in leading academic journals, including Journal of Negro Education, American Educational Research Journal, Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, and Educational Administration Quarterly, among others. Her research spans both PreK-12 and higher education and is grounded in partnerships with educators, policymakers, Minority-Serving Institutions and nonprofit organizations.

As a lead methodologist and project principal investigator/co-principal investigator for the U.S. Department of Education’s Regional Educational Laboratory (REL) Southeast, she directed more than 30 multi-year, interdisciplinary research and technical assistance projects including major initiatives at Minority-Serving Institutions (MSIs). Notably, she co-founded and led REL Southeast’s Postsecondary Success at HBCUs Partnership, one of IES’s first and longest-standing REL-HBCU partnerships (2017–2026). Her service on the SUS Futures Commission, which was established by the Southern University System to develop a strategic plan for Southern University and A&M College and its sister institutions and advisory board member and Chief Research and Innovation Officer for the National Institutes for Historically Underserved Students is a testament to her commitment to MSIs and the students they serve.

“Through our work with the Ross Institute, we will build partnerships and facilitate networks committed to culturally responsive inquiry and the dissemination of evidence-based strategies to improve outcomes for New Majority students. We will also position ourselves to train and cultivate the next generation of scholars who will not only carry forward relevant, rigorous research to address the educational needs and challenges of these students but also drive innovative approaches to meet those needs. Simply put, it’s about our students, the partnerships we build, the scholars we train, and the research, innovation, and dissemination that follow, are all to ensure they excel, says Lampkin.”

Building on a Legacy of Faculty Development

Jones-Dance assumes leadership of CILT after serving seven years as the center’s co-facilitator, contributing extensively to faculty professional development with a strong focus on culturally responsive teaching and equitable teaching practices. Her current research focuses on learning analytics and technology integration in higher education, emphasizing institutional data governance, privacy protections and the development of ethical, context-sensitive frameworks for the use of student data. Her previous research examined human learning across the lifespan, with particular attention to sociocultural influences on education.

Jones-Dance also redeveloped University 101, Heritage’s foundational course designed to support student success and reflect the university’s inclusive mission. She earned a bachelor’s degree in child and family studies from Washington State University, a Master of Science in early childhood studies from Walden University, a Master of Business Administration from Colorado Technical University and a doctorate in learning analytics from National University.

Since its founding in 2003, CILT has served as a cornerstone of Heritage University’s commitment to teaching excellence. The center supports faculty development and well-being  through workshops, classroom observations, individualized consultations and other professional development opportunities grounded in research-based, student-centered practices designed to enhance student learning.

CILT’s influence expanded significantly in 2010 through a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. The funding brought nationally recognized scholars to campus to share expertise in Native American and Hispanic cultural studies. More importantly, the project preserved those presentations in digital formats, creating a lasting educational resource that faculty continue to integrate into their courses and that remains available to the broader university community. What began as a lecture series evolved into a permanent repository of knowledge that continues to enrich teaching and learning across campus.

Positioning Heritage for the Future

Gilmer said the appointments reflect Heritage University’s continued investment in educational excellence and its mission of transforming lives through higher education.

“The combination of these two dynamic educational leaders will be a force for good at a critical time in higher education and an important moment for Heritage University as we prepare to implement a new strategic plan,” Gilmer said. “One appointee is internal, and one is external, one uniquely prepared to carry forward the successful work of CILT which has been so important on our campus for a long time and one uniquely prepared to bring enhanced research capacity and a national network of higher education colleagues to position the Ross Institute as a national calling card for what makes Heritage University so special in service to first-generation, rural, new majority students.”

Dr. Lampkin and Dr. Jones-Dance will begin their new assignments in the summer of 2026. For more information, contact Davidson Mance at (509) 969-6084 or mance_d@heritage.edu.

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