Student Profile: Lindsay Hiser, MPP Class of 2023

After graduating with a double major in organizational studies and communication and media studies from University of Michigan, Lindsay Hiser landed her first job in development at the National Public Radio (NPR) headquarters in Washington, DC.

“It was a perfect marriage of my two majors: working at a media organization as a comms major, but also working at an organizationally complex news system that operates at both the local and national level as an org studies major.  I gained a reputation there—favorably, I believe—for asking a lot of questions about that complexity."

Working in development, Hiser said she gained a broad understanding of the work of the entire organization. “We knew about the stories being published by the news desks, we knew the podcasts that were coming out, we knew the different initiatives that were being led by member stations across the country. It was an empowering job where you could take pride in your knowledge of the organization’s impact and communicate that to donors."

Hiser found herself gravitating towards projects that required data analysis to measure impact, but said she was lacking in the understanding of how to do that methodologically. "I realized that I was approaching that measurement with intuition rather than any kind of rigorous analysis. At the same time, as I read the articles and listened to the news published by the desks at NPR, I realized that policy is in everything—it’s everywhere. Policy school presented a way to engage with that work directly.”

That was when Hiser decided to apply to the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy. “Hearing from David Chrisinger, the director of the writing program, in the admissions process made me feel empowered about coming to Harris, because I was coming to a quantitative school that valued that storytelling aspect of policy. I knew then that I would have both something to be challenged by, but also something to be confident in—that I could contribute back to the community.”

Now a second year in the Master of Public Policy (MPP) program, Hiser has delved deeply into coding and analytics. “I’ve been successful building on the skills one at a time, starting off with Math & Coding Camp, then coding throughout the Core, and then taking the Data Analytics Certificate as a way to build on the R programming language. Next quarter I’m enrolling in a Machine Learning class taught in Python.”

Outside of her focus on data analysis, Hiser exercises her storytelling skills as a member of Chicago Policy Review (CPR), the student-led graduate policy review at Harris.

While exploring a breadth of policy areas with CPR, Hiser has found that she is interested in climate policy, behavioral science, and computational methods of policy analysis—all of which play into her work as a Bartlett Fellow with the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago (EPIC).

In this role, Hiser assists Research Associate Professor Kimberly Wolske with studying public-facing energy programs and consumer behavior. “We’re working on a project to understand how energy performance metrics affect market price. It’s been empowering to gather and analyze data, contribute to the conversation, and help shape research questions.

When she is not hard at work, Lindsay loves spending time with her classmates. “We all share a motivation and appreciation for what we’re doing here, and you see that enthusiasm reflected not just in class, but at events, Pub nights, and even on intramural sports teams. We’re all here to learn from one another, and that’s something that makes me very proud to be a part of the community at Harris.”