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PhD Destinations

Our PhD students go onto jobs in academia and policy.

This is a list of the initial positions that some of our recent research students went on to secure after they successfully completed their PhD in the Department of Social Policy.

PhD completion 2025

Thomas Stephens
Postdoctoral Fellow, LSE School of Public Policy

Magdalena Rossetti Youlton
Economics Research Consultant, Inter-American Development Bank

Dijana Spasenoska
Postdoctoral Research Scientist, University of Oxford

Thelma Obiakor
ESRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of Cambridge

Toni Roldan Mones
Director, EsadeEcPol, Center for Economic Policy

Mary-Alice Doyle
Principal Researcher, Nesta

Ceri Hughes
Research Fellow, University of Manchester

Guodong Ju
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, China Institute at University of Alberta, Canada

Katy Footman-Bamber
Independent research consultant

Chiara De Poli
Research Fellow, Care Policy and Evaluation Centre, LSE

Eugenia Bilbao-Goyoaga
Advisor, Spanish President’s Office


PhD completion 2024

Joe Strong
Leverhulme Early Career Fellow, School of Politics and International Relations, Queen Mary University of London

Michaela Sedovicova
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, The Centre for Longitudinal Studies, University College London

Fiona Gogescu
LSE Fellow, Deptartment of Social Policy, LSE

Grace Chang
Principal Research Officer, Department of Sociology, University of Oxford.

Gemma Williams
Technical Officer, The European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies

Liz Mann
ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow, Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion, LSE

Mario Battaglini
Senior Consultant, ICF

Ilona Pinter
Research Assistant, Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion, LSE

Eliz Wong
Postdoctoral Fellow, The Chinese University of Hong Kong


PhD completion 2023

Valentina Contreras Silva 
Economist, Employability Division, OECD, Paris Research Officer

Nicola Brimblecombe 
Assistant Professorial Research Fellow, Care Policy and Evaluation Centre, LSE


PhD completion 2022

Victoria Donnaloja
Leverhulme Eary Career Fellow, Sociology Department, University of Essex

Aapo Hiilamo
Specialist Researcher, Itla Children's Foundation

Rana Khazbak
Research Fellow, University of Nottingham

Philippa Mullins
Assistant Professor, American University of Armenia, College of Humanities and Social Science

Orsola Torrisi
Postdoctoral Associate, New York University Abu Dhabi

PhD completion 2021

Aveek Bhattacharya
Cheif Economist, Social Market Foundation

Rafael Carranza
Assistant Professor, Pontifical Catholic University of Chile (PUC Chile)'s School of Government

Valentina Iemmi
LSE Fellow, Department of Health Policy, LSE

Nicholas Mathers
Global Social Policy Consultant

Sam Mohun Himmelweit
Lecturer in Social Policy, University of Bristol

Julia Philipp
Research Director, NatCen

Joaquin Prieto-Suarez
Postdoctoral Researcher, Faculty of Government at the University of Chile and Visiting Fellow at the International Inequalities Institute at the LSE

PhD completion 2020

Antonella Bancalari Valderrama
Senior Research Economist, Institute for Fiscal Studies, London

Daniel Fujiwara
CEO/Visiting Scholar, Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science LSE, Simetrica-Jacobs

Tasseli McKay
Research Fellow, Department of Sociology, Duke University

Rishita Nandagiri
ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Methodology, LSE

Marco Palillo
Postdoctoral Fellow, Sciences Po

Melissa Shannon
Research Scientist, AP-NORC

Laura Sochas
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Department of Social Policy, University of Oxford

Ellie Suh
Postdoctoral Research Officer, Department of Education, University of Oxford

Filippo Temporin
Teacher, Collegio Vescovile Pio X

PhD completion 2019

Diego Alburez Gutierrez
Research Scientist, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research

Ewa Batyra
Postdoctoral Fellow, Population Studies Center,University of Pennsylvania

Miranda Bevan
ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow, LSE

Vanessa Davey
Postdoctoral Researcher, Parc Sanitari Pere Virgili

Ginerva Floridi
Lecturer in Sociology and Quantitative Methods, School of Social and Political Science, University of Edinburgh

Wilson Guzman
Professor, Universidad Católica de Cuenca, Ecuador

Gabriel Heller Sahlgren
Research Fellow, Research Institute of Industrial Economics

Lamia Irfan
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, SOAS University of London

Klara Lorenz
Research Officer, Care Policy and Evaluation Centre, LSE

Tze Ming Mok
Data and Insights Lead, Co-Design Lab (TSI)

Alexis Palfreyman
Research Fellow, University College London

Tatiana Paredes-Torres
Research Fellow, University College London

Nora Ratzmann
Research Fellow, DeZIM-Institut

PhD completion 2018

Edward Barnett
Chargé d’Affaires (Deputy High Commissioner) to Kenya & Permanent Representative to the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and UN Habitat