Lizette Pabón

Lizette Pabón understands the power of education more than most. Raised in the projects of New York City, she was determined not to be a statistic; she knew she needed to do something to better herself.

Lizette started on the road to higher education after enrolling in SCAN New York’s Reach for the Stars after-school program. The program helped her get into Hudson School, an elite private school where she graduated salutatorian.

The first in her family to graduate college, Lizette now holds three degrees. In 2003, she earned her bachelor’s in neuroscience from Smith College. She soon realized her calling was educating others and moved to South Florida to pursue a master’s in public health from FIU. In 2007, she graduated and began working at the Miami-Dade Area Health Education Center, focusing on nutrition and tobacco-free education. She was on the committee that helped make FIU a tobacco- and smoke-free campus.

Lizette then turned her attention to education technology and began her doctorate in education, specializing in learning technologies. Her dissertation, under the mentorship of Professor Thomas Reio, examines adult learning from online training programs and its link to performance among cruise agents. The study was supported by game theory that predicts adults not only learn online, but also excel if the instructional design is informative as well as creative and fun.

Lizette’s work is currently under consideration for publication by the Journal of Educational Technology & Society.