Contact Us
Phone: (202) 885-2940
Graduate programs: spagrad@american.edu
Undergraduate programs: aupublicaffairs@american.edu
Our Team
Jordan Matsudaira
Co-Director
Jordan Matsudaira is a professor at the School of Public Affairs at American University. He is also a Nonresident Fellow at the Urban Institute in Washington, DC and a Visiting Scholar at the Federal Reserve Banks of Chicago and Philadelphia. He served as Deputy Under Secretary at the U.S. Department of Education in the Biden Administration. While serving in that role he created the office and served as the first ever Chief Economist of the Department to bring economic research and quick-turn data analyses to help design higher education regulations and executive actions related to loan repayment, higher education accountability, data disaggregation, student debt relief, and more. From 2013 to 2015, he served on President Obama's Council of Economic Advisers as Chief Economist where he worked on labor, education, and safety net policies, including gainful employment regulations of for-profit colleges, an expansion of the federal overtime protections in the Fair Labor Standards Act, and the development of the College Scorecard, a data tool providing college-specific information on student outcomes. His academic research focuses on using government administrative data to understand the causal impact of education and labor market policies and institutions on the economic outcomes of low-income Americans.
Stephanie Riegg Cellini
Co-Director
Stephanie Cellini is co-director of PEER and a professor of public policy and economics at George Washington University. She is also a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research and previously served as editor of the journal, Education Finance and Policy and as a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Her research focuses on federal student aid policy and the for-profit sector. Prof. Cellini spent time in government as a fellow with the U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Education and Labor and as a senior consultant for the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. Her work has been published in a range of journals including the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, and the American Economic Journal: Economic Policy and has been covered in the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and other major media outlets. Prof. Cellini earned an M.A. and Ph.D. in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles and a B.A. in public policy from Stanford University.
Clare McCann
Managing Director of Policy and Operations
Clare McCann leads the Center’s policy work and directs its operations. Prior to joining the PEER Center, she was the Director of Higher Education at Arnold Ventures. McCann also worked as a senior policy advisor for the U.S. Department of Education on issues related to higher education in both the Office of the Under Secretary and the Office of Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development; and with New America’s Higher Education Program.
Research Staff
Kristen Allen
Graduate Research Assistant
Kristen Allen is an education researcher and PhD student in Public Policy and Administration at American University. Her research interests and expertise include accountability in higher education, student outcomes in the labor market, and socioeconomic mobility through postsecondary educational attainment. She previously worked at Hanover Research as an education research director and senior analyst. She holds a BA in Religious Studies from Elon University and an MEd from the George Washington University.
Ayanna Camara
Graduate Research Assistant
Ayanna Camara is a first-year MPA candidate at American University’s School of Public Affairs. In 2019, she graduated from Florida State University, double majoring in political science and history. Upon completion of her Master’s program and fellowship with the U.S. State Department as a Pickering Fellow, Ayanna hopes to continue her advocacy for international relations and education reform through the lenses of diplomacy.
Chris Johnston
Graduate Research Assistant
Chris Johnston is pursuing a PhD in Public Policy and Administration at the American University School of Public Affairs with a research focus on the interface between education policy and labor economics. He received a Master of Science in Applied Economics and a Bachelor of Science in Finance from the University of Maryland, College Park. Before starting his PhD, he worked in commercial banking and as a long-term substitute high school math teacher.
Leonardo Restrepo
Graduate Research Assistant
Leonardo Restrepo is an education researcher and PhD student in Public Policy and Administration at George Washington University. He uses applied statistics and computational methods to evaluate policy approaches to school segregation, school finance, and student-life outcomes. He has previously worked at the Urban Institute’s Center on Education Data and Policy, the Community College Research Center at Teachers College (Columbia University), and Sesame Workshop. Prior to his work as a researcher, Restrepo worked as a middle school teacher in Brooklyn, New York. He holds a BA in political science from the University of Chicago and an MS in Learning Analytics from Teachers College.
Fellows
Kathryn Blanchard
PEER Fellow
Kathryn Blanchard is a PhD candidate in the Economics Department at George Washington University. Her research studies how higher education policies impact student outcomes, with a focus on student loan policies. She is working as a PEER Fellow in the Office of the Chief Economist in the U.S. Department of Education's Office of the Undersecretary. She previously worked as an Evaluation and Research Summer Fellow at the U.S. Department of Labor's Chief Evaluation Office. Before beginning her graduate studies, she taught high school mathematics. She holds a Master's degree from GWU and a Bachelor's degree in mathematics and economics from the University of Delaware.
Research Advisory Council
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Dominique Baker, Associate Professor of Education and Public Policy, University of Delaware
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Susan Dynarski, Patricia Albjerg Graham Professor of Education, Harvard Graduate School of Education
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Stella Flores, Professor of Higher Education and Public Policy, University of Texas at Austin
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Adam Looney, Executive Director of the Marriner S. Eccles Institute for Economics and Quantitative Analysis, The University of Utah
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Jesse Rothstein, Professor of Public Policy and Economics, Director, Center for Studies in Higher Education, University of California, Berkeley
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Judith Scott-Clayton, Professor of Economics and Education, Teachers College, Columbia University
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Kevin Stange, Professor of Public Policy, University of Michigan
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Lesley Turner, Associate Professor, Harris School of Public Policy, University of Chicago
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Sarah Turner, University Professor of Economics and Education, University of Virginia