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Access Recording

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Preparing for Court Action in Admissions – Policy, Practice, Implementation (Hint: The Work Started Yesterday!)

Speaker Biographies

Art Coleman Headshot

 Art Coleman is Managing Partner and co-founder of EducationCounsel LLC.  He provides policy, strategic, and legal counseling services to national non-profit organizations, school districts, state agencies, and postsecondary institutions throughout the country, where he addresses issues associated with: student access, diversity, inclusion, expression, and success; faculty diversity, inclusion and expression; and institutional accountability and accreditation. 

Mr. Coleman previously served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, where, in the 1990s, he led the Department’s development of the Department’s Title VI policy on race-conscious financial aid, as well as OCR’s first comprehensive Title IX sexual harassment policy guidance. 
 
Mr. Coleman was instrumental in the establishment of the College Board's Access and Diversity Collaborative (ADC) in 2004, which he has helped lead since its inception.  With a focus on issues of diversity and inclusion, he has authored amicus briefs in Grutter v. Bollinger (2003), Gratz v. Bollinger (2003), and in Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin (I and II, 2013 and 2016).  His advocacy work also includes the development of a federal amicus strategy and numerous briefs on behalf of transgender students in federal court litigation throughout the United States.  

A former litigator, Mr. Coleman is a 1984 honors graduate of Duke University School of Law and a 1981 Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Virginia.  He has testified before the U.S. Senate and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.  He is a member of the Board of Directors of GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network); the Lab School of Washington, which serves students with learning differences; the National Council for State Authorization Reciprocity Agreements (NC-SARA); and a past chairman of the Board of Directors of the Institute for Higher Education Policy. 

Mr. Coleman is currently an adjunct professor at the University of Southern California’s Rossier School of Education, where he teaches a course on enrollment management law and policy. 

 

Lorelle Espinosa

Lorelle L. Espinosa serves as program director at the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, where she is responsible for developing and implementing evidence-based strategic priorities for the Foundation’s grantmaking to effectively advance diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in STEM higher education. Her portfolio includes oversight of the Foundation’s MPhD program, which supports eight University Centers of Exemplary Mentoring (UCEMs) nationwide. UCEMs provide fellowships, peer and faculty mentoring, and networking and professional development resources aimed at helping graduate students from underrepresented groups successfully complete graduate study in STEM fields. Espinosa also oversees the Sloan Indigenous Graduate Partnership, a Sloan initiative that partners with eight U.S. campuses to help meet the specific needs of American Indian and Alaska Native students, enabling them to pursue advanced degrees in STEM while continuing to participate meaningfully in tribal life. 

Prior to joining the Foundation in 2020, Espinosa was Vice President for Research at the American Council for Education. In this role, she was responsible for building the organization’s research portfolio with special emphasis on diversity, equity, and inclusion; for promoting innovation and data use to close equity gaps; and for helping shape the national conversation around issues of access to and success in higher education for diverse populations. Espinosa began her career in student affairs and undergraduate education at the University of California, Davis, Stanford University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

With more than 20 years of experience in higher education practice, policy, and research, Espinosa is a national voice on issues pertaining to college access and success for diverse populations and on the role of equity-minded leadership in postsecondary settings. She is the lead author of Race, Class & College Access: Achieving Diversity in a Shifting Legal Landscape, an influential study of how recent legal jurisprudence is changing race-conscious policies in education and was PI of the national study, Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education. Espinosa served as committee co-chair of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine study that produced the report, Minority Serving Institutions: America's Underutilized Resource for Strengthening the STEM Workforce, and has spent much of her career focused on DEI in STEM higher education with an early emphasis on women of color in these fields. 

Espinosa has contributed opinion and scholarly works to peer-reviewed journals, academic volumes, and industry magazines, including the Harvard Educational Review, Research in Higher Education, the Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed, Diverse Issues in Higher Education, and CNN.com. She has held leadership roles in the Association for the Study of Higher Education and the American Educational Research Association and is a research affiliate of the University of Southern California’s Pullias Center for Higher Education. 

A Pell Grant recipient and first-generation college graduate, Espinosa earned her Ph.D. in higher education and organizational change from the University of California, Los Angeles; her bachelor of arts from the University of California, Davis; and her associate of arts from Santa Barbara City College. 

 

Shannon_GundyShannon Gundy is Assistant Vice President of Enrollment Management at the University of Maryland in College Park, Maryland where she began as an Admission Counselor in 1990. She currently oversees freshman and transfer recruitment, admission and enrollment; marketing and strategic communications for Enrollment Management, the University Visitor Center, Passionate about helping students to navigate the college admission process, she has served in a variety of capacities in Maryland's admission office.  

A graduate of Howard University in Washington, D.C., she began her career in college admissions as an Admission Counselor at College of Notre Dame of Maryland. In addition to her role in Enrollment Management, Shannon also serves as a member of the International Baccalaureate College and University Task Force, the Maryland/Delaware/District of Columbia ACT Council, and the College Board Access and Diversity Collaborative Advisory Committee. She is also a faculty member for the AACRAO (American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admission Officers) Admissions Counselor-Recruiter professional development course. 

Committed to issues of access in college admission, Shannon is particularly interested in serving traditionally underrepresented students as they work to pursue higher education. She, like Nelson Mandela, believes that "Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world."