The Evans School is excited to welcome two new faculty this academic year: Assistant Professor Alex Zhao and Professor of Practice Elizabeth Ayer.
Alex Zhao recently received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of California San Diego. Alex’s research examines Indigenous politics, political behavior, sovereignty, political economy, and political geography. His dissertation mapped the political geography of Diné Bikéyah (Navajo Nation) to understand how Indigenous Americans experience politics as citizens of both sovereign Indigenous nations and the U.S.
Prior to coming to the Evans School, Alex worked on research and public policy projects for the Navajo Nation, including the offices of the president and government development, and the Yankelovich Center for Social Science Research at UC San Diego.
This year he will be teaching PubPol 101 Public Administration and Democracy for our undergraduates and PubPol 587 Native Nations for our graduate students.
Elizabeth Ayer joined the Evans School from a federal government team that aimed to transform how technology delivers for the public. She worked on government products like Direct File (tax preparation), Notify (text messaging for agencies), and the DOJ civil rights complaints portal, as well as system modernization for benefits eligibility. Before joining public service, she worked in a variety of private-sector tech roles, coaching teams at the spot closest to her heart: participatory methods to make tech serve people.
Elizabeth is currently teaching PubPol 499/599 Civic Technology to a mixture of undergraduate and graduate students and will be teaching PubPol 549 Redesigning Public Services as part of the Leading Public Innovation Certificate. She will also be joining Dean Jodi Sandfort on December 1 for our next Dean’s Forum conversation on AI and public policy.