Star Rivera-Lacey

Star Rivera-Lacey, Ph.D., is the vice president of student services at San Diego Continuing Education in California and has over 20 years of community college administrative and leadership experience. Her community college experience includes serving as a vice president of student services; dean of counseling; director of EOPS, CalWORKs, and outreach; and director of student support services; she is a former tenured associate professor and counselor.

Her leadership skills and qualifications include experience with developing and implementing innovative programs for diverse traditional, and nontraditional, student populations in both credit and noncredit educational settings. Her current scope of responsibility includes providing leadership for the development, implementation, and evaluation of key components of student services. Dr. Rivera-Lacey is also heavily engaged with integrated planning and provides leadership for the institution’s student success and equity efforts.

She was raised in Oceanside, California, and is proud to have started her postsecondary education at a community college. She went on to receive a bachelor’s degree in liberal studies and earned a master’s degree in education (with an emphasis in multicultural counseling) from San Diego State University. She has also earned a Ph.D. in education from Claremont Graduate University. Her dissertation focused on exploring the relationship between low-income, first-generation, Latinx community college students and counselors with a directed focus on aspiration and achievement and increasing student success outcomes.

Dr. Rivera-Lacey loves photography, is a fledgling runner, and is a first-degree black belt in Shorin Ryu karate.