Pakethia Harris, PhD, is a Senior Technical Assistance Consultant at the American Institutes for Research (AIR). She has expertise in K–12 special education curriculum and policy and school finance and more than 10 years of experience in special education. As CIFR’s Part B TA Co-Lead, Dr. Harris provides technical assistance and professional development to states on fiscal policies and procedures and on collecting, reporting, analyzing, and using high-quality IDEA fiscal data. Harris also supports CIFR’s product development and provides TA to states through the National Center for Systemic Improvement (NCSI) and the IDEA Data Center (IDC).
Before joining AIR, Dr. Harris was a graduate fellow at the University of South Florida researching the reciprocal relationship between education policy and the multiple dimensions of education finance and economics. Dr. Harris has taught at the university level and was an instructional coach developing and providing professional development workshops to teachers and administrators on curriculum and instruction and behavioral interventions.