Dr Julia Spears

Dr. Julia Spears is Assistant Provost for Online Education and Certification at Marshall University, where she leads the university's online strategy, the Design Center, and its microcredential and certification portfolio. She launched a data partnership with Workforce West Virginia connecting educational attainment records with enhanced wage records — work now positioned to scale statewide — and co-chairs Credential WV while helping lead the West Virginia Collaborative to Advance Learning Mobility (WV CALM), a statewide effort with Education Design Lab, AACRAO, and Strada Education Foundation to make credentials portable and skills visible. She also leads Marshall's project in AACRAO's inaugural Learning and Employment Record (LER) Accelerator cohort, one of 22 selected nationally, and serves on Marshall's Presidential Task Force on AI. A Certified Practitioner of Human-Centered Design, she brings design thinking to each of these efforts.