Dr. Packard is an expert on mentoring, persistence, and strategies to promote effective learning and collaboration, especially in STEM fields. An educational psychologist by training, Packard’s current research focuses on strategies to improve higher education ecosystems, such that faculty, staff, and student success are considered collectively. She has extensive expertise in the experiences of first-generation college students, people of color, low-income students, working students, nontraditional-aged students, and community college transfer students. A multi-racial first-generation college graduate herself, Packard strives to identify success strategies that turn aspirations into realities. As a trained intergroup dialogue facilitator, she has led many workshops, trainings, and keynote talks focused on dynamic leadership, creating cultures of mentoring, navigating difficult conversations, among other topics.

She was recognized by the White House with the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), the highest honor bestowed by the U.S. government upon early-career scientists and engineers. Her work has been generously supported by the National Science Foundation, through the CAREER program,  GSE, and DUE. As a Google-funded co-PI, she is completed a project focused on expanding capacity in computer science through inclusive peer mentoring. As a co-PI with funding from Microsoft, she developed a new mentoring curriculum and open access video series, also available in Spanish. She has published many articles with her undergraduates and a book in her area of expertise. Packard was recently named a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).  From 2025-2026, she was on loan to the National Science Foundation, where she contributed to the initiatives within the Division of Undergraduate Education, the STEM EDU Directorate at large, and the cross-cutting CAREER program.

At Mount Holyoke, Packard has held numerous leadership roles including Associate Dean of Faculty, Founding Director of Teaching and Learning, the Director of the Harriet L. and Paul S. Weissman Center for Leadership, and the Senior Advisor for Science. For the 2026-2027 school year, Packard will hold an American Council on Education (ACE) Fellowship where she will further develops her leadership.  Outside of MHC, Packard has held residencies in multiple institutions. In 2002, Packard was a visiting scholar at UC-Berkeley. In 2016, she completed a Whiting foundation fellowship in Ireland in association with the University of Limerick. In Spring 2018, Packard served as a Chancellor’s Leadership Fellow-in-Residence at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst contributing to a number of strategic equity and inclusion initiatives. During the 2018-2019 school year, she was a Faculty Fellow at the University of Michigan sponsored by the National Center for Institutional Diversity, with support from the Colleges of Engineering and LSA (Literature, Sciences and Arts).

Packard earned her bachelor’s from the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor in 1995 (where she was a participant in the SROP program), and earned her Ph.D. from Michigan State in Educational Psychology in 1999. She has been on the faculty at Mount Holyoke College since 1999. 

Packard is a proud mother of two who loves mystery books, walking, and biking (at a leisurely pace), hiking, and pilates.