Donna Jovanovich, Ph.D., has worked with 23 colleges in 10 different states as a data coach for Achieving the Dream.
Retired Director of Institutional Effectiveness from John Tyler Community College in Richmond, Virginia, Dr. Jovanovich coordinated strategic planning, assessment, program evaluation, research, and reporting. Prior to coming to John Tyler, she served as the Director for Institutional Effectiveness at the Virginia Community College System Office, where she did state‐level policy work with Achieving the Dream, worked with the Community College Research Center, led state-wide developmental mathematics redesign, and served on the Achieving the Dream Cross-State Data Work Group.
Dr. Jovanovich’s extensive experience with community colleges as an administrator and a mathematics professor includes the conduction of numerous studies of student success in the workforce, distance education, and college readiness.
She began her community college career teaching mathematics at J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College, and there she began her career in administration serving as assessment coordinator of student learning, developing a model for program evaluation and directing the self‐study for reaffirmation of accreditation. At Virginia Commonwealth University, she developed a mechanism for comprehensive reporting to document “completing the loop” of institutional effectiveness through a useful and usable web‐interface tool.
Education
Ph.D. (Education, concentration in research and evaluation) | Virginia Commonwealth University
M.S.T. (Mathematics) | University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh
B.A. (Mathematics) | Lake Forest College
Past Experience
Director of Institutional Effectiveness | John Tyler Community College
Director of Institutional Effectiveness | Virginia Community College System
Senior Research and Evaluation Associate | Virginia Commonwealth University
Assessment Coordinator | J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College
Mathematics Professor | J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College
How has education changed your life/your family?
Education is a life-long learning experience and continues to feed my curiosity about various topics. It gave me the skills to become a researcher, evaluator, and mathematics professor. In addition, it opened many windows into different worlds of literature, art, music, and languages and allowed me to explore different facets of my being and become a better person. The new experiences and knowledge that education provided ultimately helped me grow professionally, but intangibly, it also expanded my knowledge and understanding of people and the world.