Current MPA Students

Andrew is a state government professional who most recently served as Deputy Chief of Staff at the Maryland Department of Veterans and Military Families. In this role, he modernized agency operations by launching the first dedicated constituent services program, establishing data-driven performance dashboards, and advancing legislative priorities. Prior to this, Andrew worked on political campaigns across the United States, gaining experience in organizing, communications, and fundraising. Andrew spent this past summer on the Commissioner's team at the New York City Department of Transportation, the largest and most complex municipal transportation agency in the country. He supported executive operations and led development of the agency's strategic action plan. Originally from Massachusetts, he holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from McGill University. Before Princeton, Andrew lived in Washington, D.C., and enjoys cooking and going on long runs.

Raised in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, Arrington graduated from Williams College with a degree in political science. On campus, he served on the editorial board of the Williams Record, worked with student run consulting group Alhambra, and was a member of the club cycling team. As part of his undergraduate studies, he spent a year abroad at Oxford University, studying international relations. Arrington also fueled his interest in foreign policy and politics by interning at Voice of America, a local democratic primary campaign, and Washington-based market research firm Quadrant Strategies. After graduation, Arrington started his career at McKinsey and Company’s Washington D.C. office, working with public and social sector clients on strategy and operations questions. Following this role, he moved into federal government service, holding operations roles on the Commerce Department’s CHIPS Program Office’s Investment team, working on process design and execution surrounding the deployment of $39 billion in financial incentives to semiconductor manufacturing firms. Most recently, he served as a State Capacity Fellow at the Institute for Progress, working with the CHIPS Office’s inaugural leadership team on Factory Settings, a publication reporting on best practices from the CHIPS effort to inform future large-scale government programs. After Princeton, he hopes to return to government, working in foreign policy roles related to U.S. and China relations and American national security. In his free time, he loves to go to the cinema and try new restaurants.

Zach was raised along the Pohick Creek tributary in Northern Virginia. He graduated magna cum laude from the University of Virginia with degrees in economics and global studies: environments and sustainability, and a minor in statistics. His studies focused on low-income energy access and community solar deployment. After graduating, he worked at ICF International, supporting the U.S. Department of Energy and state energy offices in profiling energy supply-chain vulnerabilities from New York City to Alaska’s coastal villages. Zach then served as a Fulbright-Nehru Researcher, leading a quasi-experimental study and agricultural survey of solar irrigation adoption in the Pandharpur Taluka of Maharashtra, India. Additional experiences, like Census enumeration during the COVID-19 pandemic and interview-based activism in Gujarat, deepened his commitment to fieldwork and community engagement. Prior to Princeton, Zach was a Project Associate with the UChicago Energy and Environment Lab, implementing government-partnered randomized controlled trials on water conservation and heavy-duty vehicle pollution enforcement policy in the Western U.S. At Princeton, he plans to merge these experiences and explore sustainable development policy oriented toward equitable, scalable, and community-driven resource governance. Zach is a novice permaculturist and ecological economist. He enjoys backpacking, vegan cooking, and engaging the climate community in Chicago.

Anna is a Princeton MPA student from Stockton, California. She holds an associate's degree in political science from San Joaquin Delta College and a Bachelor of Arts in politics from the University of San Francisco. Her hometown’s struggles with poverty and gun violence sparked her passion for social policy. Anna served on the San Joaquin County Bail Reform Committee, where she researched correlations between bail schedules and median incomes in rural counties. She then interned for the Western Center on Law and Poverty, advocating at the California State Legislature for bills that decriminalized street vending, eliminated phone call fees for the incarcerated, and protected unhoused people’s vehicles from impound. She went on to become the Government Relations Director at the Faculty Association of California Community Colleges, serving as the organization's registered lobbyist for three years. There, she mobilized hundreds of faculty and students to defend community college policy from special interest groups, taught legislative advocacy workshops across California, and led the organization to become the fourth most successful lobbying entity in the state. Anna is the founder of Mathews Advocates, a lobbying firm that helps nonprofits navigate the legislative landscape and build civic power. After completing her MPA, she intends to continue advocating for policies that ameliorate poverty in marginalized communities. In her free time, Anna enjoys making music, writing, exploring the outdoors, and spending time with her cat.

Born and raised in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, Elena graduated summa cum laude from the George Washington University with a B.A. in political science and a B.S. in international affairs. During her undergraduate studies, she studied and conducted research in Uganda examining anti-sexual harassment policies in educational institutions and later co-authored work on democracy and security in sub-Saharan Africa with the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Following graduation, Elena worked on USAID’s largest global nutrition program before serving as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Kosovo, where she supported local civil-society groups with organizational capacity-building, youth programming, and community development initiatives in Serbian-majority areas. Prior to starting at SPIA, she supported U.S. Department of State-funded international exchange programs and later worked in communications and program management roles with USAID and the Defense Security Cooperation University. Her policy interests include information integrity, peace and security, and international cooperation. In her free time, she enjoys trail running, Eastern European folk dancing, and hiking.