The Westfield Historical Society has announced that Dr. Carole Shaffer-Koros, a lifelong educator and public servant, will be inducted into the Westfield Hall of Fame in 2025. The Hall of Fame honors past and present residents who have brought distinction to the community. Dr. Shaffer-Koros, the youngest of nine children, was born during the Great Depression. She graduated as valedictorian from Riverside High School in western New Jersey before earning a nursing diploma from the University of Pennsylvania. After working in psychiatric nursing for two years, she enrolled at Douglass College of Rutgers University, where she received a B.A. in Spanish while working part-time as a campus nurse. While at Douglass, she met her future husband, Robert Koros, and the couple eventually moved to Westfield in 1965 with their two daughters, Diana and Silvia. Dr. Shaffer-Koros later returned to the University of Pennsylvania, earning her M.A. and Ph.D. in Romance Literature and Literature while commuting to classes in Philadelphia and researching her theses. Faced with limited job opportunities for women in university foreign language departments, Dr. Shaffer-Koros pivoted her career and joined the Kean College faculty in 1974. There, she retrained as a professor of English as a Second Language (ESL), designing and enacting a program to integrate foreign students into academic studies. She later taught and led the M.A. in Liberal Studies program, became Chair of the English Department, and was promoted to Associate Dean of the School of Liberal Arts before becoming the founding Dean of the School of Visual and Performing Arts at Kean University. In addition to her academic career, Dr. Shaffer-Koros co-founded EDGE (Expanded Dimensions in Gifted Education), which offered classes for gifted students at Edison Middle School in Westfield until the school system integrated gifted education into its curriculum. Throughout her career, Dr. Shaffer-Koros has published academic articles and book chapters, given presentations at international conferences, and held leadership positions in professional associations. Following her retirement from Kean University, she has served in various roles with local organizations, including the Westfield Historical Society, the Genealogical Society of the West Fields, and Premiere Stages, a professional theatre group at Kean University. Dr. Shaffer-Koros is one of seven inductees in the 2025 Westfield Hall of Fame class, which also includes William McLaren Bristol, Christopher Lundy Campbell, Charlotte Nichols Montgomery, Keith Hertell, Dariell Walsh, and David Wroe. The induction ceremony is planned for Friday, Oct. 10. Submit Union County community news to union@njadvancemedia.com. Generative AI was used to produce an initial draft of this story, which was reviewed and edited by NJ Advance Media staff.