Ellie Harris

Principal research fellow and head of children and young people

Ellie is a principal research fellow and head of children and young people's policy at IPPR. 

At IPPR, Ellie works on a range of topics across public services, focused on how services deliver for children and young people. This includes education, early years, family and youth policy. Ellie is an experienced policy maker who specialises in turning evidence into actionable recommendations and uses her skills as an evaluator and qualitative researcher to build evidence-based policy.

Before joining IPPR in 2026, Ellie was Director of Policy and Evidence at an education charity, Head of Policy at the What Works Centre for Children and Families, and a senior policy advisor at the Department for Education.  

More from this author:

  1. Rear view of unrecognizable people walking together on the street

    A tough hand: Why rising youth inactivity demands urgent action

    On Thursday, new data will likely show the number of young people who will be out of education, employment or training (NEET) will surpass 1 million for the first time since 2013.
  2. A primary school classroom. In the foreground are pots of pencils and rulers and water bottles. Children in blue school uniform are blurred in the background

    The IPPR Inclusion Taskforce

    Our new inclusion taskforce will focus on reforming England's failing special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) system.