Introducing the 2025 – 2026 SRCD U.S. Policy Fellows

Hatice Gursoy, Ph.D.
Hatice Gursoy is an applied developmental psychologist whose research examines how familial, cultural, and school- based factors shape the well-being of children and youth from diverse backgrounds. She explores parenting, social identity, and early learning in families from various racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic contexts. Her work also focuses on culturally responsive teaching and teacher-student relationships to promote equity in education. Using mixed- methods research, Hatice bridges research and applications to develop data-driven solutions that support positive development and inclusive learning environments for all children.

Lily Steyer, Ph.D.
Lily Steyer, is an incoming SRCD Policy Fellow with the California Department of Education. Using mixed methods, she studies structural drivers of racial and socioeconomic disparities in child development. Her work focuses on developing and evaluating community-based interventions to enhance equity in early childhood health and learning outcomes. She aims to inform social policies that foster more just and effective systems of support for young children and families. She holds a Ph.D. in Developmental & Psychological Sciences and a B.A. in Human Biology from Stanford University.

Jess Sullivan, Ph.D.
Dr. Jess Sullivan is an incoming SRCD state agency fellow in the New York State Office of Child and Family Services (OCFS). She is currently a Professor at Skidmore College, where she serves as Associate Chair of the Psychology Department. She is also currently an Associate Editor at the journal Child Development. Jess Holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in Developmental Psychology from the University of California, San Diego, and a B.A. in Religious Studies from Wesleyan University. Dr. Sullivan's research focuses on understanding learning both withing the United States, and across cultures, educational systems, and languages. She studies early childhood and has conducted numerous research projects on how children learn about numbers, language, and the social world around them.

Lee LeBoeuf, Ph.D. 
Dr. Lee LeBoeuf is an incoming SRCD state agency fellow in the Division of Early Childhood Care and Education at the Virginia Department of Education. Lee will finish her Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology at the University of Viriginia (UVA) in the spring of 2024. At UVA, Lee is an Institute of Education Sciences pre-doctoral fellow, a LIFE Academy Fellow with the Max Plank Institute for Human Development in Berlin, and a Community Data Fellow for the Equity Center at UVA. Her doctoral research focused on education equity, student-teacher relationships, and Montessori preschool. Prior to beginning graduate school, Lee taught elementary school in Cleveland, Ohio. She received her B.A. in psychology from Ohio Wesleyan University in 2017.

Briana Ermanni, Ph.D.
Briana Ermanni is an incoming SRCD State Policy Post-Doctoral Fellow in the New Hampshire Bureau of Child Development and Head Start Collaboration. She is currently a doctoral candidate at Virginia Tech where she will earn her Ph.D. in Developmental Science in Spring 2025. She holds a B.A. in Psychology from Michigan State University and an M.S. in Psychology from Virginia Tech. Briana’s research employs person-centered analytic techniques to examine how individual differences in infant and child temperament shape socioemotional development in school-aged children. Additionally, Briana has experience fostering action-oriented partnerships between researchers and policymakers, as well as evaluating research translation strategies. She is particularly interested in leveraging these skills to explore how developmental science can inform child and family policy.

AnnaMaria Boullion, Ph.D.
AnnaMaria Boullion transferred from Shasta Community College, with an A.A. in Behavioral Science, to California State University, Chico, where she earned both her B.A. in Psychology and M.A. in Psychological Science. She recently received her Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology from the University of California, Riverside, with specialized training in Quantitative Psychology as well as Diversity and Inequality Psychology, along with a certificate in Science- to-Policy Translation. AnnaMaria’s program of research focuses on identifying modifiable mechanisms of adolescent coping and adjustment during the transition to adulthood among communities with histories of early life adversity.

Katherine Hagan, Ph.D.
Katherine Hagan, is a bilingual clinical and developmental psychologist. She completed her Ph.D. at the University of Oregon. She then served as a predoctoral trainee and postdoctoral clinical psychology fellow within the Public Services and Marginalized Populations cluster of the University of California, San Francisco's Clinical Psychology Training Program. Katherine is interested in how the scientific study of intergenerational processes might be harnessed to promote and sustain healthy development in infancy and beyond.