With a childhood dream of becoming a doctor, Dr. Kelly Lester was prepared to push her passion for dance aside to follow what she believed was the path she was meant to take. Instead, she found a love for teaching that she never expected — and a way to combine her love for dance with her dream of becoming a doctor.
“I dreamed of being a doctor. I thought I was going to help take care of people in that way,” Lester, the Associate Provost for Faculty Success and dance professor, said. “But that’s what I think is ironic too, because I’m a doctor now — it’s just not the same kind. It didn’t go the way that you would ever imagine.”
While her dream was to become a doctor, Lester’s passion for dance was strong. She often spent her afternoons after school in her grandmother’s dance studio. Dance was her life, yet she never believed she could make a career out of it. Instead, she decided to go to school to be a doctor.
As a first-generation college student with high grades and an interest in anatomy, Lester believed that there was only one path for her to take.
“I was strong in my academics. I was a National Merit Scholar — again, things were just pointing in a direction of what I understood to be what you do if you’re smart,” Lester said.
But life is unpredictable, and nothing ever goes as planned. When Lester arrived at the University of Memphis, she believed that she would become a doctor. Despite not majoring in dance, it was still her whole world, so she continued to take dance classes at the university. Those classes opened her eyes to possibilities she never imagined and gave her a new understanding of what a career in dance could be.
“The classroom experience I had with the teachers changed my perspective,” Lester said. “Teaching me something I already knew, but from a different lens, and that excited me.”
This class led her to change her major to dance and showed her that a career in dance could be more than just performing on Broadway. Two professors, Moira Logan and Holly Lou, played a major role in her decision. They both showed her how women could be leaders and help build community with a degree in dance — and she remains close to them today.
Lester never wanted to be a teacher. Even when she first started dancing, she imagined herself performing, not teaching. However, that changed when she started teaching at the University of Mississippi.
At 21 years old and freshly graduated, Lester began teaching college students — and it didn’t take long for her to realize that this was what she wanted to do.
“There was something about teaching at that level that just stirred my passion and so I continued to perform and teach in other ways,” she said. “It excited me and I saw that there was growth in that.”
She spent a year teaching at Ole Miss before returning to the University of Memphis. She continued to perform whenever she could but focused on teaching students. She later moved on to SUNY Brockport in upstate New York for graduate school, where she earned her Master of Fine Arts.
After graduating, Lester began applying for jobs and eventually landed at USM on a visiting contract. She was originally supposed to teach for nine months, but when a faculty member retired, a tenure-track position opened up. Lester applied and got accepted.
In 2008, Lester began working at USM as a dance professor, putting her heart and soul into helping the program grow. Her interest in teaching and love of engaging with the students led to her becoming the inaugural director of the Center for Faculty Development, and she later transitioned into the Provost’s Office.
“My little anecdote that I tell all the time is, ‘We thought we would be here for one year, and now it’s 18 years later and I’m still here,’ but that’s because for me what kept me here was the value of the arts at Southern Miss. It’s accredited in all four arts but there’s also the impact that it has on the community,” Lester said. “I was doing my dreaming job, and I was doing it in a place where I felt like people really cared.”
All of this eventually led to her current position as assistant provost for faculty success, while she continues to teach dance as well. In her current role, Lester oversees faculty development, awards, and other affairs involving faculty, along with some student areas such as academic integrity and grade appeals.
As her role focuses on faculty success, she works to support them in their work and responsibilities. Despite her position primarily serving faculty, Lester believes it’s equally important for students as “faculty success leads to students success.”
“For me, it’s always been at the center our students, and I think it goes back to my first-generation status right like I know the transformation that a college education had for me,” Lester said. “And I know that we can do that, not just for first-generation college students here but for all of our students and that is what excites me and motivates me to do all the hard work that I do.”
Lester went back to school to earn her doctorate, accomplishing her dream of becoming a doctor in a different way while still being able to follow her passion for dance and find an unexpected love of teaching. This brought her to USM, where her love of teaching and care for the students and faculty has taken her farther than she ever expected.
Recently, she applied for the Fulbright International Education Administrators Program, which allowed her to spend two and a half weeks in France with 14 other administrators from across the country. The group attended seminars and toured facilities to learn about France’s higher education system.
“It was so exciting, I mean I think again when you say like, ‘what did you dream of,’ like I’ve always known about the Fulbright program but never imagined that I would be able to call myself a Fulbright scholar,” Lester said.
Lester had known about the program as a retired coworker had done it in the past and she had known a Fulbright scholar from New Zealand, which sparked her interest. After applying, she waited two months before receiving her acceptance in May. She quickly prepared for her trip, which took place in early October.
In France, Lester and the other scholars toured different universities, including the Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne and NEOMA Business School, visited the Cité Internationale Universitaire de Paris, which is a housing area for international students, went on walking tours like the black history tour “La Paris Noir,” got the chance to talk with French college students, met the mayors of two different cities in France, and more.
The trip allowed her to make connections with administrators and build partnerships with universities and businesses abroad. As a lifelong lover of the arts, she also saw it as a chance to explore how the arts were integrated into French culture and education.
“I was interested to see how the arts were integrated within the culture, within the institutions and then also equally interested in the experiential education approach that is in the French higher education system,” Lester said. “Students were actively engaging in internships and research — those things that we do, but could do better.”
One of the biggest takeaways from her trip was how France incorporated internship experience into all degree programs — not just certain ones. In France, internships are a requirement for every student, regardless of major. This intrigued Lester and made her think about how USM could do something similar to benefit students while also encouraging partnerships with industries and strengthening community ties.
“From the moment you meet Dr. Lester, you sense her passion,” said Maurine Pace, information specialist for research development, training, and engagement. “She cares equally as much about helping faculty engage and connect students with creative curiosity and a desire to learn beyond what’s on the page or screen right in front of them. I’m thrilled she was selected for the Fulbright France exchange. I know she will apply concepts from the experience to enrich instructional leadership, inspire innovation, grow research collaboration, and expand community partnerships locally and abroad for USM.”
Lester plans to use what she learned in France to help USM continue to grow and improve — not only for the faculty but also for the students. Her goal is to help students explore the possibilities that come from trying new paths, just as she did.
She used to believe that being smart meant she would become a medical doctor and majoring in dance meant following the path of performing, but instead she discovered a love for teaching and a way to impact both students and faculty.
“I see our students come in and that sense of pressure — that they have to know what they’re going to do without the time to explore,” Lester said. “I realized that there were so many possibilities and I think that’s true of all majors that we offer at Southern Miss, so many possibilities and you don’t have to know the exact track if you just allow yourself to be curious, to be hard-working, to be open to opportunity, then you’ll follow a path that is your own.”