Of all the solutions that have regularly been offered to tackle the problems facing higher education today, perhaps no term is as popular as “innovation.” By now, the Academy for Innovative Higher Education Leadership, a joint exercise between Arizona State University and Georgetown University, has engaged more than 125 academic leaders from provosts to deans in this challenge. For Rivera-Mills, her experiences as a first-generation college student who didn’t know how to navigate the higher education landscape fundamentally shaped her life, but, like many academic leaders, she saw herself as a reluctant leader.