The interim director of the academic side of the PEER Project is Rajeev Darolia, the Wendell H. Ford Professor of Public Policy and a Professor of Public Policy and Economics at the University of Kentucky. Dr. Darolia is also the Associate Director of the UK Center for Poverty Research, and Associate Dean of the Graduate School.”
The project was conceived by George Washington University Professor Stephanie Cellini, Student Defense President Aaron Ament and Jordan Matsudaira, in his former capacity as Associate Professor at Columbia University Teachers College. Matsudaira also served as the Chief Economist of President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers. The PEER Project is overseen by a steering committee that includes leading higher education economists and policy scholars.
These scholars and others will work closely with attorneys at Student Defense, led by Senior Counsel and PEER Project Co-Director Libby DeBlasio Webster. Student Defense is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, non-partisan organization, created in late 2017, by former Obama Administration officials. The organization works to advance students’ rights to educational opportunity and ensure that higher education provides a launching point for economic mobility.