In addition to promoting community college student success, part of CCRC’s mission is to equip early-career researchers with the skills needed to make meaningful contributions to the field of higher education and beyond. Each year, we proudly recognize the efforts of staff members who are pursuing graduate degrees alongside their work at CCRC.
This commencement season, we’re celebrating seven staff members who are graduating from Columbia University: Madeleine Balliette, Shakira Henry, Erin Huffer Kramer, Shayleah Jenkins, Carl Lewandowski, CJ Libassi, and Jared Mahoney.
“Though it is always bittersweet to say farewell to graduates,” CCRC Director Tom Brock said, “we are grateful for all their hard work and excited to see how they will apply their skills and passions to the worlds of education, research, policy, and beyond.”
Congratulations to the class of 2026!
Meet this year’s graduates:
Madeleine Balliette graduated with her master’s in education policy from Teachers College (TC). At CCRC, she has assisted with data collection and fieldwork for a project looking at corequisite remediation reform in Louisiana, as well as for one focused on early childhood educators in Illinois.
Prior to CCRC, Balliette taught second graders in Nashville, Tennessee. “Teaching helped me realize that many of the challenges students face aren’t just solely instructional, but systematic,” Balliette said. “That experience made me want to amplify my impact through policy work.”
After graduation, Balliette hopes to stay in the research and policy space and pursue her passion for advancing K-12 educational access and equity, especially in New York City’s public schools.
Shakira Henry earned her master’s degree from the Department of Education Policy and Social Analysis (EPSA). At CCRC, Henry worked on a project to identify strategies for improving outcomes for marginalized community college students.
“Working with CCRC complemented my studies because I was learning the theory in the classroom but able to apply it at CCRC,” Henry said.
For her master’s project, she investigated the disparities in public school funding through a New York City-based case study and highlighted how inequities in educational finance undermine opportunities for low-income and minority students.
“It’s funny, because when I came to TC I disliked research,” Henry said. “But after working at CCRC, I love it!”
Erin Huffer Kramer earned her PhD in economics and education from Teachers College. As a Postsecondary Education Applied Research (PEAR) fellow—a program administered jointly by CCRC and TC’s ESPA department to train PhD students in applied research—Huffer Kramer completed an apprenticeship with the Ohio Department of Higher Education. There, she led a research project evaluating the effects of the Choose Ohio First Scholarship, which supports STEM students in the state. Her work in Ohio inspired the central paper of her dissertation.
Huffer Kramer first became interested in applied economics during her undergraduate studies and went on to work for three years at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. “I learned more about how to think about our intertwined systems of state, local, and federal public finance,” she said.
After graduation, Huffer Kramer plans to explore postdoctoral opportunities.
Shayleah Jenkins earned her master’s in journalism from Columbia Journalism School. She joined the communications team in 2022. Since then, Jenkins has contributed to the organization’s website, newsletter, blog, and social media accounts.
Prior to CCRC, Jenkins worked with multiple humanities centers and an independent education newspaper in Philadelphia. She enrolled at Columbia Journalism School to strengthen her writing skills and to gain multimedia reporting experience.
Post-graduation, Jenkins will continue as a member of the communications team at CCRC.
Carl Lewandowski is graduating with his master’s in anthropology and education from Teachers College. Lewandowski has worked closely with CCRC throughout his program, contributing to projects on developmental education, instructional technology, and self-directed learning skills in online STEM courses.
Lewandowski has found his studies and the hands-on research experiences he has had at CCRC to be complementary. “My courses in ethnographic methods came in handy on site visits, while my experiences at CCRC made working on independent research for my degree feel a lot more feasible,” he said.
Lewandowski will continue at CCRC throughout the summer. Longer term, he hopes to find opportunities to contribute to museum education.
CJ Libassi earned his PhD in economics and education from Teachers College. A PEAR fellow, Libassi has contributed to a project examining education policy at the City University of New York.
Before joining CCRC, Libassi taught in Maryland as part of Teach for America, an experience that made him invested in improving educational outcomes for low-income students. He later contributed to the think tank New America and studied at the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy, where he earned his master’s degree.
After graduation, Libassi will join the PEER Center at American University as a senior research associate to continue working on higher education research and policy.
Jared Mahoney graduated with a master’s of education in the teaching of social studies. Mahoney began at CCRC in 2025, working on a project evaluating the implementation of corequisite courses in Ohio colleges and universities.
Before CCRC, Mahoney taught social studies in Philadelphia, where he became interested in ways to help new teachers develop skills to foster meaningful discussion in their classrooms. This experience influenced his thesis topic, which examines how misinformation reshapes and hinders deliberation in the social studies classroom.
Mahoney will begin a PhD program in the teaching of social studies at Teachers College in the fall.
Thank you to this year’s graduates, who made essential contributions to their teams and to CCRC. Congratulations! We at CCRC are rooting for you!
