College of Education faculty member to serve five-year leadership term in National Rural Education Association

Darris Means, the Clemson University College of Education’s inaugural dean’s fellow for rural education, was elected in 2025 by the National Rural Education Association (NREA) as president-elect designate.

The five-year term will see Means go on to serve as president-elect, president, immediate past-president, and past-president, all roles that put him on the NREA’s executive committee. In the role, Means will work with the rest of the executive committee, the executive board and the organization’s executive director to develop and implement strategies to support and elevate rural education across the U.S.

“I’ve been engaged with NREA for over eight years, and I have met incredible scholars and leaders during my engagement with NREA,” Means said. “This is a pinnacle leadership role within the NREA and for my career that will provide me an important opportunity to work alongside rural educators, leaders and scholars to support rural education and rural communities.”

Darris Means

The NREA was initially founded as the Department of Rural Education in 1907. Through the years, it has evolved as a strong and respected organization of rural school administrators, teachers, board members, regional service agency personnel, researchers, business and industry representatives and others interested in maintaining the vitality of rural school systems across the country.

The NREA engages in research that charts a path for rural education, the most recent of which was its National Rural Education Association Research Agenda 2022–2027. The agenda helps to shed light on innovative rural practices, address unique rural challenges and continue to build on the strengths of rural people and places.

For the past 10-plus years, Means has focused on rural education, and his work has supported youth on pathways to and through higher education. He has seen a greater need to examine the resources and opportunities available to rural youth, not just in bachelor-awarding institutions but in post-secondary education in general. Along the way, the work of the NREA has been a “guiding light” for Means, so he is thrilled to work within an organization that has already given him so much.

“The NREA has shaped my approach to my own scholarship and my engagement, so I see my leadership role as an opportunity to give back,” Means said. “I believe there are continuous opportunities for growth and learning. I look forward to learning from rural education educators, leaders, and scholars and using the lessons I will learn to inform my work as a Dean’s Faculty Fellow for Rural Education.”

Means is a professor in the Department of Educational and Organizational Leadership Development and joined the Clemson faculty in Fall 2024. He most recently served as an associate professor of higher education and the inaugural executive director for rural and community-based education at the University of Pittsburgh.

Means began his faculty career at the University of Georgia, serving as an assistant professor of college student affairs administration and then an associate professor of college student affairs administration. Before his faculty career, Means served as the inaugural assistant director and then inaugural associate director of Elon University’s Elon Academy, a college access and success program for students in Alamance County, North Carolina, who are the first in their families to attend college or have a financial need.

Means uses critical, participatory and visual methodologies and methods to investigate opportunity gaps in education, particularly STEM education. He also examines postsecondary education access and opportunity for rural students, Black students, first-generation college students and students from low-income backgrounds.

Means earned a Ph.D. in educational research and policy analysis with a concentration in higher education from North Carolina State University, a master’s degree in counselor education with a concentration in student affairs from Clemson University, and a bachelor’s degree in political science and sociology from Elon University.