Research Affiliate - Policy

Alejandra Acosta is a policy analyst with the higher education initiative at New America. She conducts research and analysis on the equitable and ethical use of predictive analytics in higher education. Acosta previously interned at Lumina Foundation and the Kresge Foundation, where she informed investments and strategies that aimed to make higher education more equitable. Prior to that, she was a graduate researcher at the National Forum on Higher Education for the Public Good, where she analyzed institutional policies that affected undocumented students in Michigan’s public higher education institutions. She is also a proud to have served as a college adviser for low-income first-generation students in Silicon Valley. The product of public education from K–12 to college, Acosta holds a bachelor’s from UCLA and a master’s in higher education from the University of Michigan. Her immigrant family’s education success story and work with marginalized communities are the foundation of her work.

Jason Lee serves as a postdoctoral fellow at SHEEO where he supports the association’s research enterprise. His prior research focuses on evaluating federal, state, and institution-level policies and programs to determine where in the postsecondary pipeline students struggle to succeed. This work has been published in a number of outlets including the Journal of Higher Education, the Journal of Human Resources, and the Higher Education: Handbook of Theory and Research. Dr. Lee has over 10 years of experience working in education, including time spent as a K-12 teacher, working as a campus administrator in a variety of settings, and, finally, working as a quantitative researcher for two state higher education agencies in Tennessee. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Georgia’s Institute of Higher Education, his master’s degree from Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and his bachelor’s degree from Slippery Rock University.

Willis A. Jones is an associate professor of higher education at the University of Miami.  His primary area of research examines the finances of intercollegiate athletics. In particular, he is interested in how the presence, successes, and/or failures of college athletics influence external actors and resource providers. Dr. Jones also explores and publishes on a wide range of higher education issues, including college costs, educational innovations, shared governance, and Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

Dr. Jones previously held positions at the University of Kentucky and the University of South Florida. He earned his B.A. from the University of North Texas, his M.Ed from the University of Arkansas, and his Ph.D. in Higher Education Leadership and Policy from Vanderbilt University.

Darrell Lovell is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at West Texas A&M University teaching courses on public policy and public administration as well as state and local politics. Lovell’s academic research focuses on public management and governance in education policy at the primary and secondary levels. His current projects examine the framing of state public education takeover policy, the impact of performance management expectations on coproduction and public management relationships at community colleges, and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on institutional communication and administrative discretion in higher education.

His pedagogy research explores ways to enhance undergraduate research, building learning communities in online courses, and active learning techniques in political science and public administration. He earned his Doctor of Public Policy and Administration degree from West Chester University.