Dr. Elizabeth Davidson Pisacreta is the Associate Director for Policy and Research at Ithaka S+R, a not-for-profit service that helps the academic and cultural communities serve the public good and navigate economic, technological, and demographic change. In her role, she leads a team of researchers and analysts who conduct research and strategic consulting projects designed to improve postsecondary opportunities for underrepresented students. She serves as the project lead for the American Talent Initiative and current and prior projects focus on state higher education policy, institutional change management, higher education finance, community college transfer, and program coordination and evaluation.

Prior to Ithaka S+R, Dr. Pisacreta was a senior official in the New York City Department of Education, leading strategic planning, communications, continuous learning, and policy decision-making for the district-wide implementation of teacher development and evaluation. She is also the co-founder and Secretary of the Board of Code Nation, an educational non-profit that provides more than 1300 low-income students in New York City, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Chicago with coding instruction and paid internship opportunities in prominent tech firms. She began her professional career teaching high school math in Philadelphia’s public schools. Dr. Pisacreta earned her PhD in the economics of education from Columbia University.