Leadership
Founders of Higher Ed Abroad
The HEA Founding Partners are high-level professional experts who have deep knowledge about quality international education and academic relationships. These two veteran international educators have a combined 50 years of experience on the ground as ex-pats in Asia (in China, Japan, Vietnam, and the broader region) working on behalf of American universities in multiple models of transpacific collaboration. They are experienced in other global regions as well, including Europe and the Middle East.
Founding Partners and Directors
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Lynne A. McNamara, PhD -- former Executive Director of the Vietnam Education Foundation (VEF), a US Federal Government agency; career-long educator who has lived and worked in Asia, the Middle East, and Europe for the advancement of international education and exchange.
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Glenn L. Shive, PhD -- founder and former CEO of the Hong Kong America Center that administered Fulbright exchange programs in collaboration with Fulbright organizations in Asia, including China, Southeast Asia, and India.
About
Lynne A. McNamara, PhD
Co-founder of Higher Ed Abroad (HEA), Dr. McNamara has devoted her professional career to international education. She served as Executive Director of the Vietnam Education Foundation (VEF), a US Federal Government agency in the Washington, DC, area. VEF provided Fellowships for over 600 Vietnamese nationals to pursue US doctoral degrees in the STEM fields and provided grants for post-doctoral Vietnamese to participate in non-degree programs at US universities and for US Faculty to teach at Vietnamese universities. McNamara created financial arrangements for VEF with over 100 leading US universities. She developed seminars on the application and selection process as well as cultural orientations on living and studying in the US, and she brought the Graduate Record Exam (GRE) to Vietnam. Dr. McNamara developed relationships with US and Vietnamese universities and professional organizations and met regularly with US congressional members and Vietnamese ministries. She was awarded the Medal for the Cause of Science and Technology, issued by the government of Vietnam through the Ministry of Science and Technology. Upon her return to Colorado, Dr. McNamara co-founded the US Vietnam Council, Denver, and has served as Executive Consultant for the Vingroup Science and Technology Scholarship Program, managed by VinUniversity in Hanoi, Vietnam, and for the Vingroup VinFuture Foundation. McNamara began her career in international education as a study abroad student at the University of Bologna, Italy. Later as an Instructor in the Dept. of Italian, University of Colorado (CU), Boulder, she was awarded an Outstanding Teacher Award. She established and directed the first CU semester-long Study Abroad Program in Siena, Italy. Then she ventured into English as a Second Language (ESL), teaching for the CU Economics Institute and the Intensive English Center. McNamara went on to establish and direct the American Language Academy (ALA) in Colorado and then became Academic Director of the English Teacher Training Program (ETTP) in Cairo, Egypt. Managed by Fulbright and funded by USAID, ETTP was part of a multi-national team of Americans, British, and Egyptians to train pre-service and in-service teachers of English at universities and training centers throughout Egypt. Dr. McNamara’s career expanded to Asia where she directed the first Arizona State University (ASU) program in Tokyo, Japan, to train Japanese students in ESL before transferring to ASU, and she initiated the Association of American Colleges and Universities in Japan. She then became Associate Professor of English at Temple University Japan (TUJ), Tokyo, and established and directed the Corporate Relations and Office of Career Development for TUJ, developing corporate internships with multinational corporations. Later McNamara was Director of Program Development in Asia for the University of Maryland University College (UMUC), focusing on online education throughout Asia. Returning to the US, she served as Director of International Programs at UMUC in Maryland and as Professor in the UMUC School of Undergraduate Studies. Dr. McNamara received her PhD in Educational Administration and Higher Education from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale and her Master’s in Linguistics and Bachelor’s in Italian and Spanish from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Now in semi-retirement, co-founding Higher Ed Abroad is the pinnacle of her achievements as a way to contribute her deep international experience and passion to global enhancement through educational endeavors benefitting the future.
About
Glenn L. Shive, PhD
Co-founder of Higher Ed Abroad (HEA), Dr. Shive has been active in international education for over 50 years. He established the Hong Kong America Center (HKAC), begun in the mid-1990s, that served nearly 20,000 students and scholars to move between the US and greater China. The HKAC closed in 2020 due to the Covid pandemic and the changing political climate in Hong Kong. Dr. Shive organized US university recruitment fairs in Asia, supervised and trained advisors in the Asian offices of EducationUSA, and made many institutional grants to Asian universities as Vice President for Programs of the United Board for Christian Higher Education in Asia. Shive has travelled extensively in Asia, visiting schools and colleges that send their graduates to the US for further study. He was director of the Institute of International Education (IIE) office in Hong Kong and was active in the NAFSA Association of International Educators and the Alliance for International Education while he was CEO of the Council of International Programs (CIP) in Washington, DC. He was an advocate for the defence of the J- and F-visa programs and is a member of the Public Diplomacy Council of America. Shive was Scholar in Residence at the Fulbright Program in the former United States Information Agency (USIA), prior to its merger with the State Department. He was Assistant Dean at the East West Center, recruiting Asian grantees through Fulbright Commissions from Japan to India, and American grantees from universities across mainland USA. While directing the Board of Governors BA-completion program at Governors State University in Chicago, Shive was an early advocate for transnational online education to complement and augment in-person international exchanges. Now in semi-retirement, international education remains his lifelong passion. Shive was a high school exchange student for one year in Switzerland and was at Oxford and Berlin on an undergraduate junior year abroad. He also studied Chinese language at Middlebury (Vermont), in Taipei (Taiwan), and at East China Normal University in Shanghai where he also taught American studies. He researched higher education in China at the Fairbank Center at Harvard and was on a semester sabbatical at Peking University, working on American studies at universities in China. Shive lived for 25 years in Asia, participating in the era of engagement between the US and China. He continues to work to keep lines of academic communication open between China and the United States. Shive has a PhD from Temple University in Asian History, speaks Mandarin, and teaches Chinese history as the CY Tung scholar on the Semester at Sea. He has edited several books relating to academic mobility. He now lives in Perthshire, Scotland, where he relates to Scottish universities and to volunteers with the Siobhan’s Trust of Dundee, which assists internally displaced people (IDPs) in war-ravaged Ukraine. Shive has made frequent visits to India and conducted faculty development workshops at Indian colleges and universities. Starting Higher Ed Abroad is Shive’s passion project for his semi-retirement. International education has shaped his life, and he wishes to pass on opportunities for global learning and self-discovery in the wider world to a new generation of students whose academic merits far exceed their material circumstances. The US and the UK are blessed to be a magnet for these talented young people.