Mary L. Gutierrez is a third-year instructional system design and technology doctoral student at Sam Houston University. She received her bachelor's degree in the Science of Business with Information Systems from the University of Phoenix and graduated with a 4.0 GPA. She attended Trident University for her master's of Science in Information Technology Management with a concentration in Information Security/Assurance and Digital Forensics and graduated with a 4.0, Summa Cum Laude. She received her second master's from Angelo State University in Management of Business Administration with a 3.97 GPA. She is employed as a contractor for the Department of Defesense (DOD) as a Testing Manager she engages in test planning, test cases creation and execution, test automation, data creation, and artifact creation for deliverables.

Prior to rejoining the DOD, she worked for the Veterans Affair as a Quality Assurance Analyst. Her experiences include functional testing, functional training, manual testing, and artifact creation. Mandatory functional training was provided to providers, nurses, and techs on the new functionalities in the electronic medical record.

She was born to immigrants from Mexico. Her father's highest level of education was 6th grade and her mother's highest level of education was 9th grade. Her family's lack of education motivated her to continue with education beyond high school. She found her interest in higher-level education in women's studies and adult learning in higher-level education. Additionally, the pandemic shifted her interest to include remote and distance learning research. Her current academic work includes "First-generation college students in an online learning environment," which is in the manuscript phase, and "Patterns of Emotional Experiences During Emergency Remote Teaching in Taiwan," presented at the 2022 Association for Eductional Communication and Technology (AECT) conference in October.