About

In her 14 years in higher education, Dr. Searby has researched and written on mentoring in several venues: mentoring faculty and administrators in higher education, mentoring new school administrators, mentoring graduate students, and mentoring best practices. However, her two main strands of research have been on the mentoring mindset and mentoring assistant principals. She has been awarded three grants to support this research. In April 2017, she was awarded the Auburn University College of Education Outstanding Faculty Award for Research. She has enjoyed collaborating with others in much of her research. She has collaborated with educational leadership colleagues in Illinois (her native state) as well as with colleagues in Alabama, Kentucky, Michigan, and Canada. She is co-editor of the book, Best Practices in Mentoring for Teacher and Leader Development (2016). She is a senior co-editor for the International Journal of Mentoring and Coaching in Education, as well as a co-editor for The Wiley-Blackwell International Handbook of Mentoring to be published in 2018. To date, she has one co-authored book, 11 book chapters or chapter contributions, a co-edited special issue of a journal, and produced 26 publications in national and international refereed journals as well as 6 publications in editor-reviewed journals, and 8 published conference proceedings. She has made 76 international, national, and regional refereed presentations, and 11 invited presentations.

Research Interests

Leadership Development, Mentoring, Principals / Assistant Principals, Turnaround School Leadership

Education

• Ph.D. in Educational Administration, 1999 Illinois State University
• M.S. in Elementary Education, 1981 Eastern Illinois University
• B.A. in Christian Education, 1974 Lincoln Christian University

Professional Appointments

• Clinical Associate Professor, University of Florida, 2017 - Present
• Associate Professor (tenured), Auburn University, 2012 - 2017
• Associate Professor (tenured), University of Alabama at Birmingham, 2005 - 2011

Activities and Honors

• Recipient of Auburn College of Education Faculty Research Award, 2016
• Chair, International Mentoring Conference, Auburn, AL, 2015
• Recipient of the Distinguished Paper Award in the Mentoring Special Interest Group of the American Educational Research Association, 2014
• Member, Curriculum Committee, University of Florida, College of Education
• Co-Editor, International Journal of Mentoring and Coaching in Education, 2015 - present
• Member, Executive Board of the International Mentoring Association, 2011 - present

Selected Grants

Selected Publications

• Irby, B., Kochan, F., Searby, L., Boswell, J., & Garza, R. (2018, forthcoming). The Wiley-Blackwell international handbook of mentoring: Paradigms, practices, programs, and possibilities.
• Searby, L., & Brondyk, S. (2016). Best practices in mentoring for teacher and leader development. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing.
• Selected Recent Publications:
• Searby, L., Browne-Ferrigno, T., & Wang, C. (2017). Assistant principals: Their readiness as instructional leaders. Leadership and Policy in Schools, 16(3), 397-430. doi:10.1080/15700763.2016.1197281
• Searby, L. J., & Armstrong, D. E. (2016). Supporting the development and professional growth of middle space educational leaders through mentoring. International Journal of Mentoring and Coaching in Education, 5(3), 162-169. doi: 10.1108/IJMCE-06-2016-0054
• Greer, J. L., Searby, L. J., & Thoma, S. J. (2015). Arrested development?: Comparing educational leadership students with national norms on moral reasoning. Educational Administration Quarterly, 51(4), 511-542. doi: 10.1177/0013161X4539807
• Searby, L. J. (2014). The protégé mentoring mindset: A framework for consideration. International Journal of Mentoring and Coaching in Education, 3(3), 255-276. doi: 10.1108/IJMCE-04-2014-0012

Selected Links

• Dr. Searby's Curriculum Vitae