Kerri Raissian, MPA, PhD

I am a Senior Research Scientist at the Yale School of Public Health (YSPH) and the Executive Director of YSPH’s Firearm Injury Prevention Team. My research focuses on understanding policies and strategies to reduce violence and injury. As a child and family policy scholar, my work emphasizes understanding how policies may reduce family violence and increase family well-being. I am also keenly interested in understanding how to reduce firearm related injury and death – both in an outside of the family.

A hallmark of my work is its interdisciplinary nature. I draw on principles from program evaluation, economic demography, and applied microeconomics. I also employ a team approach to my work and enjoy working with colleagues across disciplines and sectors. I am currently working with prosecutor’s office around the country to evaluate prosecutor led initiatives - with the hopes of learning how to make domestic violence prosecution more effective and efficient for victims, defendants, and communities.

I am also a Sr. Fellow at the Niskanen Center and a Criminal Justice Research Fellow at Arnold Ventures. In both roles, I look for ways to continually improve our criminal justice system through the use of rigorous evidence.