Andrew P. Kelly serves as the senior vice president for Strategy and Policy at the University of North Carolina System Office, and Adjunct Professor of the Practice of Public Policy at UNC-Chapel Hill. As head of the Strategy and Policy division at the System Office, Dr. Kelly oversees the implementation of the UNC System’s strategic plan and serves as a higher-education policy expert to the president and the UNC Board of Governors.

Prior to joining the UNC System, Kelly was a resident scholar in education policy studies and the founding director of the Center on Higher Education Reform at the American Enterprise Institute, AEI.

During his time at AEI, Dr. Kelly conducted research on college affordability, innovation in higher education, and federal and state education policy.

Dr. Kelly has published work in academic journals such as Policy Studies Journal, American Journal of Education, and Educational Policy, and in popular outlets such as the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Chronicle of Higher Education, Education Week, and The Atlantic.

Dr. Kelly has He has co-edited and published six edited volumes on education policy, including Getting to Graduation: The Completion Agenda in American Higher Education, with Mark Schneider, published by Johns Hopkins University Press, and Reinventing Financial Aid: Charting a New Course to College Affordability, with Sara Goldrick-Rab, published by Harvard Education Press. Kelly has advised members of congress, state policy makers, and presidential candidates on education issues.

Kelly earned a bachelor’s degree in history from Dartmouth College, and he holds a master’s degree and Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, Berkeley.