Melissa Whatley

Melissa Whatley is an Assistant Professor of Higher Education in William and Mary's School of Education. Dr. Whatley's research applies mixed methods and advanced quantitative approaches to explore policies and practices that diversify both who accesses international education and the outcomes of these opportunities, especially within the context of U.S. community colleges.

Whatley is author of An Introduction to Quantitative Analysis for International Educators (Springer, 2022) and co-editor of Digital Internationalization in Higher Education: Moving Beyond Virtual Exchange (Routledge, 2023). Her research has been published in the Journal of Higher Education, Research in Higher Education, Review of Education Research, Journal of Studies in International Education, Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, Journal of Comparative and International Higher Education, Community College Review, Frontiers: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Study Abroad, Journal of Mixed Methods Research, New Directions for Community Colleges, Education Policy Analysis Archives, and Journal of Student Financial Aid. She is currently Editor-in-Chief of the Critical Internationalization Studies Review and serves on the editorial board of Research in Higher Education.

Previously, Whatley served as an Assistant Professor of International & Global Education at the School for International Training's Graduate Institute. She also conducted research on the community college campus outcomes and culture as a postdoctoral scholar at North Carolina State University's Belk Center. 

In 2023, Whatley received the NAFSA Innovative Research in International Higher Education Award. She was the 2018 recipient of the Association of International Education Administrators' Harold Josephson Award for Professional Promise in International Education and was also recipient of the Institute of Higher Education's Thomas G. Dyer Outstanding Dissertation Research Award (2017-18) and Zell and Shirley Miller Fellowship (2018-19).

She earned Bachelors of Arts in Romance Languages, Spanish, and Linguistics and a Master's of Arts in Romance Languages from the University of Georgia.