Senior Partner for Military Learning & Strategy
Dr. Amy Morys
I've lived this twice, and both times changed me.
The first time, I was already working in higher education, leading academic services for adult and evening learners at a mid-size private university in St. Louis, when I had an honest moment with myself. I couldn't truly understand what our students faced until I was one. So I enrolled in a master's program, joining the ranks of hundreds of thousands of adult learners who return to school each year while life keeps moving. That experience taught me things no job description ever could. What grit really looks like at midnight before a deadline. What it means to walk into work the next morning and actually use what you learned the night before. Those lessons reshaped how I led, how I taught, and how I showed up for students.
The second time, I used my Post-9/11 GI Bill to earn my doctorate, returning to the classroom a full decade later while juggling a more demanding professional role and my duties as a Master Sergeant in the Illinois Air National Guard. The stakes were higher, the competing demands were real, and the experience was humbling in the best way. It gave me something no amount of professional training could — a bone-deep understanding of the layered challenges military-connected students face when they dare to pursue a degree. That understanding drives everything I do.
What is your personal adult learner story?
What aspect of adult learning are you most focused on?
My work lives at the intersection of military service and higher education, and I'm here to close the gap between the two. I specialize in helping colleges and universities build rigorous, meaningful pathways that genuinely recognize what service members and veterans already know. That means rolling up my sleeves with faculty and academic leaders to evaluate military learning against real academic outcomes and expanding credit for prior learning in ways that have both integrity and impact. But I'm equally focused on something less visible. Building institutional capacity so that the commitment to military-connected learners doesn't live or die with one passionate advocate. It has to be baked into the culture.
It's impossible to name just one, but my favorite moments always involve faculty. Specifically, the ones who show up genuinely curious about evaluating military learning for college credit and leave as true believers. Watching that lightbulb go on - when an educator can sit with a military training curriculum, hold it up against academic learning outcomes, and see the match made with real integrity and rigor - is something I never get tired of. And when that good work finds its way to a student veteran who finally feels seen by their institution? That's everything. An institution that honors military learning by awarding - never giving - credit where it's due isn't just doing right by veterans. It's changing trajectories. When a student realizes they can complete a credential they thought was out of reach because their prior learning was finally recognized, that's the whole point.
Favorite project you’ve worked on?
Honestly, this is the most exciting moment I've seen in this field. Institutions that have done the hard, unglamorous work of building credit for prior learning infrastructure are now positioned to be genuine agents of change, not just for veterans but for the entire adult learner population. The narrative is shifting. Military learning is finally being recognized for what it always was — rigorous, outcome-driven, and worthy of academic credit. And that recognition isn't charity. It's equity. We still have enormous ground to cover, but the momentum is real, the institutional will is growing, and I have never been more energized to be in this incredible ecosystem.
What excites you about the future of adult learning?
After two deployments to very sandy, very hot, and very "undisclosed" locations courtesy of the United States Air Force, I think I've met my lifetime quota of beach. The mountains win every time! I love the cool air, the serenity of nature, and the sense that something ancient and unbothered is all around me. Just the majesty of the mountains and absolutely no one asking me to hydrate.