Elizabeth Bell

Elizabeth Bell serves as an Assistant Professor at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research seeks to reduce unnecessary hassles that prevent citizens from accessing public services, improve the effectiveness of government programs, and restore trust in government. Her research agenda is driven by two distinct goals: 1) diagnosing failures in policy design and implementation that undermine the effectiveness of public programs, and 2) designing and testing interventions aimed at improving program outcomes, with a focus on college access and affordability.

Prior to joining the LBJ School, she was an Assistant Professor in Miami University’s Department of Political Science and an Assistant Professor at the Askew School of Public Administration and Policy at Florida State University. She also served as an Associate Fellow and Academic Affiliate for the Office of Evaluation Sciences (OES) from 2020-2024. In her work with OES, she designed and implemented randomized control trials aimed at reducing unnecessary hassles in federal programs and increasing access to federal programs for vulnerable populations. Professor Bell has developed researcher-practitioner partnerships with a wide range of federal, state, and local governments including the Department of Education, Small Business Administration, Internal Revenue Service, Social Security Administration, the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education, and Tulsa Community College. Her work has been published in flagship journals including the Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Public Administration Review, Journal of Politics, and American Educational Research Journal. 

Professor Bell graduated with her bachelor’s from Southwestern University and received her PhD in Political Science from the University of Oklahoma in 2019.