Staff

Jodi Khan

Grants Administrator

Alana Foley (Dulaney)

Statistician

Alana is a researcher and statistician on the Getting on Track Early for School Success project. She received her PhD in Applied Developmental and Educational Psychology from Boston College in 2014, and was a Postdoctoral Scholar in Susan Levine’s Cognitive Development Lab at The University of Chicago from 2014-2017. Her research centers on understanding the roles of executive functions, math anxiety, and socio-economic factors in children’s mathematical learning, as well as designing school- and home-based interventions to reduce socioeconomic inequality in children’s early mathematical learning opportunities.

Janet Sorkin

Project Coordinator

jesorkin@uchicago.edu

Ella Sherman

Lab Manager

esherman1@uchicago.edu

Ella graduated from Tulane University in 2025 with a B.A. in Sociology and Social Policy. While at Tulane, she served as a Research Assistant at the New Orleans Collaborative for Early Childhood Research, an intern for the National Center for Research on Education Access and Choice, and a teacher’s aide at Newcomb Children’s Center and other New Orleans preschools. She has previously worked with the University of Chicago as a Policy Research Intern at the Inclusive Economy Lab. Ella is interested in creating equitable early childhood experiences and researching methods for mediating the effects of poverty on children’s cognitive development and educational outcomes.

Raquel Buriani

Lab Manager

raquelburiani@uchicago.edu

Raquel received her B.A. in Psychology and M.A. in Cinema and Media Studies from the University of Chicago in 2025. Prior to the Cognitive Development Lab, she worked in the Development of Social Cognition (DSC) Lab from 2023 to 2025 as an Undergraduate Research Assistant. Currently, she is working as a Research Analyst for the Active Playful Learning program.

Amma Bromley-Perry

Research Analyst

ammabp@uchicago.edu

Amma is a 2025 graduate from the University of Chicago, earning a BA in Psychology with honors, and a BA in Comparative Human Development. A recipient of the Marylyn C. Grabosky Thesis Prize in education, Amma researched the relationship between spatial skills and spatial language in math word problems with mentorship from Dr. Susan Levine and Dania Carr, a graduate student in the Cognitive Development Lab.

Elijah Greenwood (They/He)

Research Analyst

elijahg@uchicago.edu

Elijah (They/He) graduated from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 2021 with a B.S in Human Development and Family Studies, and a B.M.A is Instrumental Music Performance.

At UIUC, Elijah worked as a Research Assistant for the Adolescent Development and Parenting During Transitions (ADAPT) lab, investigating parental advice giving and adolescent receptivity to advice. After graduation, Elijah supported the local community as a Family Support Home Visitor, working with first-time parents and their infants through a trauma-informed lense on parenting practices and child development education. Elijah is now a graduate student at the Erikson Institute, studying social work and child development.

They are excited by research that explores parenting styles and behaviors, attachment theory and its affect on relationships, and education strategies in the classroom for young children through a developmental lens. Elijah is a Research Analyst for the Cognitive Development Lab on the Active Playful Learning program.