Kelly Mack, PhD

A career in science may take many shapes and happen in many professional settings, including within industry, academia, government and nonprofit sectors. Here, Kelly Mack, PhD, a former Porter Physiology Development Fellow, discusses her work designing professional development programs to empower undergraduate STEM faculty across the U.S. to educate future generations of scientists, mathematicians and engineers. 

What do you do?  

I am responsible for contributing to the reform of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) higher education in ways that structure and position the U.S. for global competitiveness in science and engineering. Faculty are at the heart of this effort because of the significant and undeniable influence they have on whether students, especially those from racially underrepresented populations, persist in STEM fields. More specifically, I have the privilege of designing and deploying a national platform for STEM faculty that offers meaningful professional development and connection to a community.  

My training as a physiologist provides me with a unique understanding of how systems can work toward preserving the overall well-being of an organism. In applying that construct to higher education, I am able to develop unique curricula and learning experiences for STEM faculty that build their capacity —and mine —to better understand higher education as a complex system and the ways in which they can manipulate its pressure points, withstand systemic perturbations and ultimately, thrive.  

Give it context. Why is your work important? How does it contribute to other efforts? 

My work is important because faculty, more often than not, are the last group to be tended to in the reform of undergraduate STEM education. Yet, without a committed and nurtured faculty, all the investments that we make in our youth, as well as in our undergraduate and graduate students, can amount to no more than wasted time, energy and resources. If American higher education is going to fulfill its promise of educating future generations of scientists, mathematicians and engineers, it will have to ensure that STEM faculty are empowered for the work ahead. 

How did you find your way to your current role? 

I didn’t have many role models in graduate school. But there was one who I had never met. I only saw a portrait of her throughout my graduate career, but that picture aroused my curiosity about physiology outside of the laboratory. Vivian Pinn, MD, was a faculty member in the Department of Physiology at Howard University in Washington, D.C. By the time I arrived, she had already moved on to lead the Office of Women’s Health at the National Institutes of Health. But her portrait hung in the halls of the department alongside all the other faculty, and itstood out to me because there weren’t many portraits of women there, certainly not many Black women. All I understood at that time was that she, as a physiologist, was contributing something larger, something beyond the bench. And that was compelling to me.  

What outside of your job or science inspires you? What would you be doing if not science? 

I am inspired by the faculty and administrators I meet who are on the front lines of higher education. They are living through unprecedented change and somehow finding a way through it. Their creativity, resilience and tenacity make me want to do more in my own work. It’s a positive feedback loop. I’m honored to be able to support , mentor , coach andknow them and also learn from them. I will always do science. Using my physiology to usher faculty and administrators—including myself—through the pressures of the academy is what I am here for. All day. Every day.  

Kelly Mack, PhD, is the vice president for undergraduate STEM education at the American Association of Colleges and Universities.