Dr. Mauriell Amechi is a social scientist, professor, keynote speaker, and consultant with an enduring commitment to educational equity, particularly improving postsecondary education outcomes and opportunities for marginalized learners. Previously, Professor Amechi served on the Old Dominion University and the University of Redlands faculty, producing policy-relevant research and teaching classes in higher education/student affairs administration. His research agenda aims to understand and identify protective factors and policies that ensure more equitable educational experiences and outcomes among adolescents with a history of foster care. His novel research agenda emphasizes the emic (insider) perspective, based on the presumption that oppressed communities possess solutions to the conundrums they face within their wisdom. He is also the Founder of Foster Youth Empowered LLC, which supports adolescents aging out of foster care through motivational keynotes and workshops, and a board member at Foster Progress, a non-profit advocacy organization committed to removing college enrollment and success barriers.

Dr. Amechi's peer-reviewed journal publications appear in the Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, Review of Higher Education, Journal of African American Males in Education, and the Journal of the First-Year Experience and Students in Transition (JFYSIT), to name a few. His applied research has been featured in venues such as The Education Trust and Third Way. In addition to serving on editorial boards for JFYESIT and the Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice, he remains active in professional associations, namely the American Educational Research Association and the Association for the Study of Higher Education. Dr. Amechi is also affiliate faculty at the Office of Community College Research and Leadership at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and a Visiting Scholar at the Samuel DeWitt Proctor Institute for Leadership, Equity, and Justice at Rutgers University, New Brunswick.

Born and raised in Chicago, the West Side native is a proud alumnus of Chicago Public Schools. He earned a B.A. with honors from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and M.A. from Ohio State University. He also holds a Ph.D. in Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

He enjoys travel, music, sports, cycling, mentoring, and performing arts in his free time.