Our people

About

Before her current role, Andrea was a Senior Analyst at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. She has finished a PhD in Economics at the University of York.

In July 2020, Andrea gave evidence to the Women and Equalities Committee on the unequal impact of coronavirus on ethnic minorities. Andrea has also appeared on EuroNews, Bloomberg Radio, and in print to discuss issues related to employment and groups.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures?

Andrea is an enthusiastic analyst, interested in improving data infrastructure on underserved communities.

About

Tanya’s background is in Psychology and Economics and has spent her career so far at NatCen, IFF research and Kantar Public (now Verian).

Outside of work, Tanya is interested in anything wellness related ranging from yoga and meditation to watching reality TV. She also enjoys going to drawing classes, travelling and, after living in Paris for a year, learning French.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures

Tanya is passionate about scoping and running high quality impact evaluations that generate evidence on how to improve EET outcomes for disadvantaged young people and helps to address systemic inequalities. She oversees a portfolio of feasibility and impact evaluations including Building Futures, PLIAS and What Works Programmes.

About

Previously Emily has worked within Higher Education, where she evaluated widening participation schemes, to facilitate underrepresented students in accessing university. She has also worked within the What Works Network, for TASO and PERU, on a number of Randomised Controlled Trials. Emily holds a BA in Sociology and Quantitative Methods, and a MSc in Applied Quantitative Methods.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures

Emily is a Senior Analyst interested in using data and research to enable young people to overcome social inequalities.

Our much-loved colleague, Dr Jane Colechin, Deputy Director of Evidence and Evaluation, passed away at the start of 2025.

Jane was one of the first people to join Youth Futures Foundation and was a tenacious driver of our journey from start-up to What Works Centre, to shaping our strategy to take us through the coming four years. Jane spearheaded our evidence generation efforts, including both the design and delivery of impact evaluations of youth employment interventions and the development of guidance and methods for evaluators.

Read our tribute to Jane.

About

Before joining YFF, Abigail was a Senior Research Officer at the ONS undertaking labour market analysis that informed government policy relating to economic inactivity. Her work on economic inactivity due to long term sickness received widespread media attention. As well as a BSc in Economics, Abigail has a MSc in Inequalities and Social Science from the LSE.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures?

Abbie is a Senior Economist passionate about producing impactful data and analysis to reduce social and economic inequalities.

About

Chris joined Youth Futures in 2020, after 17 years at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF), a research funder with a mission to eradicate UK poverty. Chris served on the Social Security Advisory Committee at the Department for Work and Pensions for 10 years and was a member of the UK Commission for Employment and Skills Policy Expert Group. Before JRF, Chris worked in research at the Home Office, the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit, hospitals in Hammersmith and Bradford and for the Transport and Road Research Laboratory.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures?

Chris is Director of Impact and Evidence, leading a team of researchers, evaluators, analysts and economists.

About

Prior to joining Youth Futures Foundation, Sophie worked as a Research Manager for Learning and Work Institute, where she managed a range of research and evaluation projects related to adult learning and skills. In her spare time, she likes to travel and salsa dance.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures

Sophie is a Research Manager in our Impact and Evidence Team. She manages several of our research projects focused on apprenticeships, employer engagement, and ethnic disparities in employment.

About

Alice began her career working in schools, supporting students with ASC and learning difficulties, before moving into the charity sector in youth-centred organisations. She has held various roles spanning service design and evaluation in different capacities, enjoying the opportunity to help people understand how evaluative tools can help improve support for young people. Outside of work, she enjoys listening to music and is a member of a local choir. Living near the beach, Alice enjoys walking her dog along the seafront, and one day might even be brave enough to sea swim!

What they are involved with at Youth Futures

Alice is the lead for evidence generation for our Connected Futures programme. She designs approaches to capture evidence, commissioning partners to deliver creative ways of wrapping evaluation around complex systemic interventions.

About

Prior to joining Youth Futures Foundation in 2021, Amanda held evaluation roles at STEM Learning evaluating the STEM Ambassadors programme, and with Family Fund, a charity that supports families raising disabled or seriously ill children and young people. She completed her doctorate in 2015, focused on evaluating the goals and milestones of gender equality in English cathedral choirs. Outside of work, Amanda enjoys walking her labradoodle in the North York Moors, and weekend trips in her campervan.
Amanda is an evaluation researcher with experience in qualitative and mixed-methods research. She leads on a variety of projects at Youth Futures including implementation and process evaluations, feasibility and pilot studies, and impact evaluations.
 

About

Jane joined Youth Futures Foundation in 2022. She has over ten years’ experience working in research and evaluation, and has led research and evaluation projects across the private, government and third sector. Outside of work Jane enjoys running, getting out into nature, and is a keen Olympics enthusiast.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures

Jane is responsible for managing a portfolio of impact evaluations. She is also leading the development of technical standards and guidance for evaluators, and is supporting work to develop Youth Futures Foundation’s data archive and data linkage strategy.

About

Tony has a background in data and systems management in charity and international development contexts.Tony has an interest in collecting punk vinyl and likes to think his record collection is unparelled.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures?

Tony supports the delivery of our Evaluation and Research grants and coordinates the Impact and Evidence Team.

About

Chris joined Youth Futures in January 2024 after five years at Foundations where he conducted and commissioned evaluations of interventions designed to improve outcomes for children in the social care system.

Away from work, Chris enjoys playing squash, sauna, the Talking Heads and the films of Paul Thomas Anderson.

What they do at Youth Futures

Chris is responsible for designing and managing complex programmes of evidence generation to understand what works to support young people into good jobs, including our What Works Programme. He also leads on the development of technical standards and guidance for impact evaluations, and the development of our data archive and data linkage strategy.

About

Daniel holds a BA in Economics from Durham University and an MSc in Economics, specialising in public policy evaluation, from the University of Bristol. Before joining the team, Dan was a Research Economist at the Institute for Employment Studies, where he developed experience of a range of evaluation methods across research projects evaluating labour market and education policy. He also led/worked on several projects commissioned by Youth Futures Foundation.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures

Dan is a Principal Economist (Evaluation) and leads on YFF’s employer-facing evidence generation programme.

About

Hannah joined Youth Futures Foundation in 2020 after five years at the Centre for Economic and Social Inclusion (CESI) and the Learning and Work Institute (L&W). She brings extensive experience in leading research and evaluation projects across labour market, welfare reform, and skills policy, working with national and local government clients.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures

Hannah leads evidence generation programmes focused on understanding what works to help young people secure good jobs. She oversees a range of mixed-method evaluations, including randomised controlled trials and theory-based impact evaluations.

About

Before joining YFF Anna worked at IPPR North, after over a decade as a researcher in higher education and in government.

What they do at Youth Futures

Anna Round is Head of Research and Impact at the Youth Futures Foundation. Her research experience includes extensive work on education and skills, regional labour markets and economies, and young people’s issues.

About

A mixed methods researcher, Peter has over fifteen years of experience in research and policy evaluation in academia and the third sector. His research has explored initiatives focused on crime and youth crime and has given voice to some of the unheard in society, including victim/survivors of domestic violence and homicide and young victims and perpetrators of crime. In 2017 he completed an ESRC funded PhD at the Centre for Criminal Justice Studies at the University of Leeds, for which he explored why some young people carry knives and how their peers responded to this. Peter is also an experienced editor; for three he was years Managing Editor of the Journal of Probation, and had his own copy-editing business as a student, during which he helped many academics and post-graduate students to improve their writing. In his spare time Peter likes to exercise and visit the cinema.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures?

Peter is a Research Manager in the Research and Impact team and manages a diverse portfolio of work including currently the Youth Employment Toolkit and Policy Journeys mapping project, and has delivered among other projects the Workplace Discrimination Survey and Review of Systems Change.

About

Zach’s focus lies in leveraging economic principles and mathematical analysis to address disparities in employment opportunities for underserved young people.

What they are involved with at Youth Futures?

Zach is an Economist, passionately committed to improving employment prospects for marginalised youth. With a BSc in Mathematics and Statistics and an MA in Economics, he uses his educational background to drive his work at Youth Futures Foundation.