[NOTE: Starting on 8/1/22, I am on a yearlong leave from BU to serve as a Senior Economist on President Biden's Council of Economic Advisers.] 

I'm an Associate Professor of Education and Economics at Boston University, where I work on the economics of education policy. My research applies causal inference methods to large quantitative data sets in order to provide rigorous evidence on the impacts of education policies, particularly with respect to postsecondary issues, STEM coursework, and more recently the COVID-19 pandemic.  

My work has been published in peer-reviewed outlets such as the Quarterly Journal of Economics, AER: Insights, AEJ: Applied Economics, AEJ: Economic Policy and the Journal of Labor Economics. It has been cited in multiple White House reports and featured by the New York Times, the Washington Post, and National Public Radio. I serve as co-editor of the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management (JPAM) and am an NBER Research Associate and CESifo Research Network Fellow. Much of my policy-related work is done as a faculty affiliate of the BU Wheelock Education Policy Center (WEPC). 

I have a B.A. in physics from Harvard, an M.Phil. in education from Cambridge University, and a Ph.D. in economics from Columbia University. Prior to starting my Ph.D., I was a public high school math teacher in Watertown, MA.