Dr. Mallory Dwinal-Palisch is a leading advocate for apprenticeship as a driver of economic mobility and workforce innovation. As President of Craft Education, a WGU company, she helps build the systems that enable people to earn a paycheck, gain work experience, and earn a degree or credential simultaneously.

Throughout her career, Mallory has focused on a simple belief: we don’t need to choose between learning and working. Her work challenges the idea that education and employment must happen separately, advancing apprenticeship as a scalable model that connects learning directly to work.

In 2020, she co-founded Craft Education to create the infrastructure behind apprenticeship-based degrees. Following WGU's acquisition of Craft in 2024, she continued leading the organization and helping expand apprenticeship pathways nationwide.

Mallory began her career as a Spanish teacher through Teach For America and later co-founded a public charter school in the San Francisco Bay Area. Those experiences shaped her conviction that too many talented people are locked out of advancement by educational models that require them to stop working to learn. That insight led her to found Reach University, an apprenticeship-based institution that helps schools develop teachers from people already serving in their communities. 

A sought-after speaker and thought leader, Mallory writes and speaks on apprenticeship, workforce policy, higher-education innovation, and the future of work. She believes apprenticeship is one of the most powerful and underutilized tools for expanding economic opportunity at scale.