Elena is passionate about using local government, community organizing, and philanthropy to build cities where all can thrive. Before coming to Princeton, Elena worked at the New York City Council, where she worked with 18 Council Members in the Progressive Caucus to align on their legislative and budget priorities. Particularly, she helped lead a $2.5B campaign for affordable housing in NYC. She also worked in community organizing at Make the Road New York, where she supported low-income New Yorkers of color to know their rights and fight for more funding for education. She began her career in strategy consulting, where she worked with groups like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, UNICEF, grassroots nonprofits, and local government agencies build their strategic plans so that their portfolios could be community-oriented, impactful, and shift power to grantees. Elena has a degree in economics from Yale University. Elena is originally from New York City and Chile, and still believes New York City is the best city in the world.

Elle is a Midwest native and alumna from American University where she studied international service with a focus on global health and environmental sustainability and identity, race, gender, and culture studies. Living in D.C. for six years, she held positions on Capitol Hill, the State Department, campaigns, and nonprofits like Habitat for Humanity International. Upon graduating from American University, she worked at a healthcare nonprofit as the health policy lead for the Midwest. This past summer, Elle worked as a Clinical Service Improvement Intern at the Department of Health and Wellness in Cape Town, South Africa. She is passionate about advancing health equity and expanding Medicaid to ensure everyone has access to healthcare. Her long-term goal is to drive equitable and accessible health policy on a governmental scale as a health equity subject matter expert.

Mera believes that U.S. social policy should equitably reflect the social contract we have to one another. In practice, this means she wants to ensure that social policy is informed by rigorous evidence developed in partnership with New American communities. As a Senior Policy Associate at J-PAL North America, she assisted U.S. states and localities in developing rigorous evidence to inform social policy. Mera also communicated extensively about the important role of researcher-practitioner partnerships in evidence-based policymaking and led an initiative exploring the role of community engagement and participatory research in government-led evaluation work. Mera holds a B.S. from The Ohio State University, where she studied economics and Russian with a minor in consumer and family financial services. Before joining J-PAL, Mera interned for a financial planning firm in Central Ohio. She also worked with a Central Ohio refugee resettlement agency and served as a long-term mentor in their youth program.

A childhood on the Gulf Coast nurtured Madeline's curiosity about the relationships between climate change, disaster, and migration. After graduating from Duke University, Madeline had a fast-paced introduction to disaster response through her AmeriCorps service in New Orleans, which spanned critical activations including the COVID-19 vaccination campaign and impact of Hurricane Ida. The experience of that year led her to continue with the New Orleans Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, where she deepened and formalized the City's relationship with key nongovernmental partners, from international foundations to local congregations. This summer, Madeline worked as a Climate Health Intern at NYC Health + Hospitals in New York. Following her studies at Princeton, Madeline hopes to be a more informed advocate with greater ability to navigate and adapt governance structures.

Emily (she/her) grew up in Elmira, New York. After earning her bachelor’s degree in economics at Harvard University, Emily moved to New York City to work at MDRC, a social policy think tank, to pursue her interest in child welfare policy as a technical research assistant. After three years, Emily transitioned to public service as a NYC Urban Fellow, eager to deepen her understanding of policy implementation after witnessing the power of research to better inform policies. Emily learned about local government and urban challenges while working at the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (NYC DOHMH). Including the nine-month fellowship, she worked at NYC DOHMH for two years as the COVID-19 collateral surveillance coordinator managing data that captured the pandemic’s impact on public health. This past summer, Emily interned in the Sustainable Socioeconomic Transformation Section of the Social Development Division at the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) in Bangkok. After SPIA, Emily hopes to address holistic child welfare policy from an interdisciplinary perspective, merging her quantitative research background with policy expertise to improve systems and enhance the accessibility of resources so that families may flourish.