Erika Kitzmiller is the author of Unchartered: How One High School Transformed First-Generation College Success (Harvard Education Press, 2026) and The Roots of Educational Inequality: Philadelphia’s Germantown High School, 1907-2014 (Penn Press, 2022). Erika studies historical and contemporary policies and practices that contribute to inequality and identifies solutions to end it. She is committed to inquiry-driven, practice-based methods to advance educational equity and social justice. She is a Research Associate Professor at the University of Chicago’s Crown School for Social Work, Policy, and Practice’s Urban Education Institute, a non-resident fellow at Harvard University’s Hutchins Center, and a research affiliate with Gordon Institute for Advanced Study at Teachers College, Columbia University.

Her work has been published in Educational Researcher, Harvard Educational Review, Teachers College Record, Dissent, the Hechinger Report, the Philadelphia Inquirer, Reuters, and the Washington Post. She has received funding from Barnard College, Columbia University, Harvard University, the National Academy of Education, the National Science Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, the Spencer Foundation, and the University of Pennsylvania. 

She has worked as a public and independent school administrator and teacher and regularly consults with businesses, schools, and non-profits. She has also served on the boards and advisory councils of the Institute for Immigration Concerns, The School at Columbia, Athena Center for Women’s Leadership, and Barnard Center for Research on Women.

She earned a Ph.D. in History, a Ph.D. in Education, Culture, and Society, and a Master's in Public Administration at the University of Pennsylvania and her B.A., magna cum laude, in History and Italian from Wellesley College.