Rochelle Smarr, Ed.D.

Rochelle Smarr, Ed.D., is the Director of Experiential Learning at UC San Diego. Dr. Smarr leads Experiential Learning initiatives to increase student awareness and participation in engaged learning opportunities beyond the classroom across campus and within community spaces, such as the UC Washington (UCDC) program, Academic Internships, and the Co-Curricular Record, an extra-curricular activity transcript. Since 2013 she has held roles in the field of community engagement with Students First - New York, City College of New York, Cornell University, University of Pennsylvania and California State University, San Marcos. She has facilitated two international community service-learning trips to the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico.  

Rochelle is an active member of LEAD CA where she was awarded the 2022 LEAD California Richard E. Cone Award for Emerging Leaders in Community Engagement. Nationally she serves on the board of the International Association for Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement (IARSLCE). A member since 2019, she currently is the vice chair of the general board, and chair of the 2024 annual conference to be held in San Diego. In 2021, she served as the virtual series facilitator for the Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities (CUMU), and in 2022 as the conference journal co-editor for Metropolitan Universities Journal for CUMU published in 2023. Dr. Smarr earned her B.A in English from San José State University,  and  M.A. from New York University in Educational Leadership, Politics and Advocacy.  Her Ed.D. in Educational Leadership is from the University of California, San Diego and California State University San Marcos.