Jill V. Hamm, William C. Friday Distinguished Professor of Education, will serve as interim dean of the UNC School of Education effective May 15. J. Christopher Clemens, UNC-Chapel Hill provost and Jaroslav Folda Distinguished Professor of Physics and Astronomy, made the announcement during the School’s full faculty meeting on April 30.
In addition to her faculty role, Hamm currently serves as the School of Education’s associate dean for research and faculty development.
Hamm will assume leadership duties ahead of the departure of Fouad Abd-El-Khalick, who leaves Carolina to become provost and senior vice chancellor for academic affairs at the University of Massachusetts Amherst on June 30, overlapping to ensure a seamless transition.
Hamm has served as a faculty member in applied developmental science at Carolina since 1999. As associate dean for research and faculty development, a role created in 2017 and held by Hamm since, she has played a leading role in growing the School’s annual research expenditures from $6.2 million in 2016 to $22.2 million in 2023, greatly expanding Carolina’s ability to better serve the people, especially students and educators, of North Carolina and beyond. Under her direction, the School increased its research capacity and expanded its pipeline through the creation of several pre- and post-award staff positions.
Hamm’s research interests center on early adolescents’ social, behavioral, and academic adjustment, and the role of peer relations in successful school adaptation. She has applied her research findings on naturally occurring academic and social processes in schools to the development and testing of professional learning experiences designed to help middle and high school teachers create supportive classroom and school environments. She is the author or co-author of more than 50 peer-reviewed journal articles and 16 handbook, monographs, and book chapters. Hamm has served as principal investigator or co-principal investigator on funded research projects totaling over $18 million.
Her research has been funded by the National Science Foundation and the Institute for Education Sciences, as well by the William T. Grant Foundation and the Spencer Foundation. She currently co-leads a $1.5 million NSF-funded collaborative research grant — CASCADE or Collaborative Activities in STEM Careers for Adolescent Engagement — with Horizon Research Inc., a Chapel Hill-based company that works to improve STEM education efforts through research. With CASCADE, the team has developed digital learning experiences and simulations for middle and high school students from underrepresented backgrounds to help them grow their skills as STEM problem solvers and collaborators, ultimately helping to enrich the STEM workforce. She also serves as co-principal investigator of a $2.86 million NSF-funded project led by Morehead Planetarium and Science Center to develop and assess the impact of interactive informal science education exhibits that highlight the work of scientists from underrepresented groups. Additionally, she is co-principal investigator of a $2 million IES-funded project in collaboration with the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health, to integrate mindfulness into school counseling in middle schools.
Hamm is a past associate editor of the Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology (JADP) and has served on the editorial boards of JADP and the Journal of Educational Psychology. She also previously directed the Social Development Intervention Research Program at the Center for Developmental Science at UNC-Chapel Hill.
Hamm holds a doctorate and master of science in educational psychology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and completed a post-doctoral research fellowship through the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Jeff Greene to serve as interim associate dean for research and faculty development
With Hamm serving as interim dean, Jeffrey A. Greene, Michael Professor, has agreed to serve as interim associate dean for research and faculty development. His interim role also begins May 15.
Previously, Greene served as associate dean for academic affairs and director of graduate studies for two and a half years until July 1, 2020. As associate dean for academic affairs, he moved the School forward in ways still felt today. He coordinated 18 faculty searches, leading to 21 new faculty members joining the School; helped develop methods for scaling the School’s existing programs to our faculty resources, leading to more informed admissions and course planning; ushered numerous programmatic initiatives through University approvals, as well as several program revisions; streamlined the process of hiring teaching assistants and doctoral student funding, as well as graduate student admissions; and served on several campus-wide committees, representing the School’s interests and raising its profile.
During his tenure as associate dean, Greene maintained a high level of scholarly engagement: publishing, co-leading several large-scale externally funded research grants, advising a dozen doctoral students, and taking on the co-editorship of the top-tier research journal in his field, Educational Psychologist.
Greene has served on the School’s faculty since 2007 after earning his doctorate in educational psychology from the University of Maryland. His research leverages the science of learning to help people be better critical consumers and producers of information, particularly in online and technology environments. He began his career in higher education administration and became interested in the science of learning as he watched some students struggle to translate their capacity into academic and lifetime success.
Greene is currently involved in cross-campus collaborative research with faculty member Matt Bernacki, School of Education graduate students, and colleagues in the College of Arts & Sciences that utilizes data from learning management systems to predict student learning and provide individualized support. He is currently expanding this work in partnership with computer scientists at North Carolina State University.
Greene is the author or co-author of three books, including the “Handbook of Self-Regulation of Learning and Performance,” “Self-Regulation in Education,” and the “Handbook of Epistemic Cognition.” He is author or co-author of more than 80 peer-reviewed journal articles and 20 book chapters. His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Education, Spencer Foundation, Templeton Foundation, and more. He has served as principal investigator or co-principal investigator on funded research projects totaling over $8 million.
Greene is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association’s Division 15, Educational Psychology, and was named a Fellow of the American Educational Research Association this spring.