About Tiece Ruffin, Ph.D.
Dr. Tiece M. Ruffin, Dean of the School of Education at Fort Lewis College, is a first-generation college graduate, professor, U.S. Fulbright Scholar, mother-scholar, nationally recognized education equity champion, and veteran teacher educator. With twenty-five years of experience across K–12 schools and higher education, she has served as a special and inclusive education teacher, reading specialist, K-12 school district administrator, teacher educator, and higher education academic leader (department chair and educator preparation provider leader, Africana Studies program director, licensure officer, accreditation coordinator).
Her work centers on special and inclusive education, Africana Studies, especially African American education, literacy, and teaching approaches that help learners experience dignity, belonging, opportunity, and success. Dr. Ruffin has published and presented globally on learners with neurodivergent, exceptional, and diverse needs; humane and responsive teaching; community-engaged learning; education justice; and the internationalization of teacher education. Her scholarship has appeared in professional conference proceedings, journals, anthologies, handbooks, and books on culturally grounded education and community-engaged learning. Furthermore, as a public intellectual, Dr. Ruffin translates scholarship into accessible public discourse through editorials, commentary, and community-engaged publications that advance humane education, educational justice, family and community advocacy, and learning environments in which every student is valued and all can thrive.
As a global educator, U.S. Fulbright Scholar, citizen diplomat, and U.S. Department of State grantee, Dr. Ruffin has led faculty study abroad experiences in South Korea and Ghana, and engaged in reciprocal, community-embedded initiatives across Ghana, Malawi, El Salvador, Colombia, and the United States. Grounded in cultural humility, human rights, local knowledge, and mutual partnership, her work has strengthened teacher preparation, advanced accessible and inclusive pedagogy, supported deaf education, and expanded culturally responsive literacy and STEM learning.
Dr. Ruffin is the recipient of numerous national, statewide, institutional, and community honors recognizing her excellence in teaching, scholarship, leadership, service, and education advocacy. As an accomplished professional, some of her distinctions include being a Martin Luther King Jr. Scholar in the U.S. Department of Education, Past-President’s Fellow of the National Association of State Directors of Special Education, a North Carolina West Education Policy Fellow, University of North Carolina (UNC) System Board of Governors Awardee for Excellence in Teaching, the UNC Asheville Alumni Distinguished Faculty Award, The Martin Luther King Jr. Association of Asheville and Buncombe County’s Rosa Parks Award, and the Tzedek Social Justice Fund Impact award She has also served on multiple educational, civic, and community boards advancing public education, literacy, justice, and community well-being. Dr. Ruffin works to build humane educational systems in which every learner is valued, and all can thrive.
Curriculum Vitae 2026