Higher Education Leader | Writer | Mentor
Hi, my name is Lirim. I am a higher education leader who helps colleges create quality academic programs and ensure student success. I also provide mentoring to early career administrators and professors as they build life-long careers in education.
Off campus, I serve as a Board Member of several community educational organizations, and I also write educational blogs, creative newsletters, and novels.
On this website, you can find information about my work and links to my writing. You can also subscribe to my blog.
You can get in touch with me through the Contact Me page on this website.
Individual Mentoring & Group Workshops
for Higher Education
For College Administrators
I can mentor deans and department managers as they learn how to lead an academic unit. Areas of focus include: creating strategic goals and budgets, writing academic assessment plans and reports, meeting accreditation requirements, and completing curriculum documents. I can also provide strategies for for employee conflict resolution, faculty tenure evaluations, and strategies for effective department meetings.
For Professors
I can mentoring professors and graduate teaching assistants as they grow to become teachers and scholars. I can help create syllabi, lesson plans, assignments, grading rubrics, strategies for student engagement, and online pedagogy. For researchers, I can help plan and edit journal articles, book manuscripts, grant applications, research proposals, and conference presentations.
For Graduate Students
I can mentor graduate students who are interested in an academic career by providing support for comprehensive exams, the dissertation process, the CV, application letters, research agendas, and teaching philosophies.
Instructional Design
I can develop, revise, or review online courses on Canvas and D2L Brightspace. Areas of focus include weekly modules, content pages, embedded multimedia, quizzes, assignments, discussions, announcements, and the gradebook.
Keynote Speaking
My keynote presentation for graduation, student groups, and community organizations features my educational journey from elementary school in Yugoslavia to high school and college in the United States. It is ideal for topics in multicultural and international education.
My Story…
For much of my childhood, my family and I lived in a small town on a mountain in Yugoslavia (now the Republic of North Macedonia). I attended elementary school in the impoverished but historic building in this picture. Yet, I was lucky because the school was in my town and only a short distance from my home.
When my family and I returned to the United States, I discovered that I was very far my behind my American classmates in every subject. I barely knew enough English to have a conversation, and I struggled to re-learn the language and to catch up on the academic material. For several months, I was the only student in my class – and probably the only student in the history of that junior high school – to be studying third-grade textbooks as a sixth grader. Luckily, my teachers were able to give me a lot of personalized attention, and I met with tutors both at school and then privately at home.
This experience taught me that education, particularly English language skills, could be both a reason for alienation and also a tool for cultural assimilation.
Once I started to learn the language again, I could talk with classmates, and I could learn at my grade level. I started to make friends and feel part of the classroom. This learning experience made me feel like I had achieved something great, and I felt a sense of pride and personal accomplishment.
This experience encouraged me to pursue a career in education. It made me realize that great things can come from education, and I have made it my life goal to help others transform their lives, their families, and their communities through education.
I hope I can inspire and help you become a great educator as well.
Lirim Neziroski 