EdD, 2014 Yvette Upton serves as a Program Specialist Literacy Educator with LOOP IT UP SAVANNAH. Previously, she worked as a communications coach with Access to Capital for Entrepreneurs. She leads communications workshops for emerging and established entrepreneurs, focusing on writing and updating business plans. She previously served as dean of students and associate vice president for student affairs at Armstrong Atlantic State University. Prior to this role she served as the director of outreach and student affairs at the Savannah campus of the Georgia Institute of Technology, where she directed the overall vision and strategy for campus student services and outreach functions. She provided direct supervision for a range of functions: marketing and communications, academic advising, auxiliary services, co-curricular activities, student campus life and K-12 educational outreach initiatives. Yvette also served as director of the Women’s Resource Center (WRC) and assistant dean of students at Georgia Tech (Atlanta campus) for a decade where she advocated for policies, programs, and services that created a more inclusive campus environment. WRC programs included the Women’s Leadership Conference, Take Back the Night, Safe Sister training, Women in the Wilderness, and graduate women’s lunches. In this role, Yvette also provided and supervised crisis intervention to women students at Tech. As chair of the Sexual Violence Task Force, she led a collaborative initiative to revise Georgia Tech’s student policy on sexual violence to include domestic violence and stalking as well as to clarify the processes for the adjudication of these cases. Yvette envisions herself as a collaborative leader, inclusive of different backgrounds and perspectives, and she strives to create a sense of community where ever she goes. She has a Bachelor of Arts in journalism and a Master of Arts in women’s studies, both from Georgia State University. Her master's thesis analyzed the experiences of female students in a predominantly male environment: "Lasting Impressions: Viewing the Georgia Institute of Technology Experience Through the Lenses of First-Year and Senior Women."
