Anthony Harrison graduated with a philosophy degree from Drexel University in 2011. His focus was predominately in social and political philosophy, studying the work of John Rawls, amongst others. This background and predisposition led him to an exciting graduate program at Northeastern University in Boston. While pursuing his master's degree in law and public policy, Harrison discovered that his primary motivation was not in writing policy, but in developing and executing strategies to measure the impact of public policy initiatives through a variety of statistical and sampling techniques.
As his focus shifted from labor policy to program evaluation and data analysis, his career began in the non-profit sector, measuring and quantifying the impact of the important work that many non-profit organizations do. He began at a workforce development organization in Boston, and returned to Philadelphia in 2014 to work for a legal services non-profit that serves the disadvantaged struggling with civil legal issues in the city.
Since then, Harrison has moved to the private sector, first in digital advertising, and now as the Director of Data Analysis for a healthcare news website. There, his team provides business intelligence services to help shape strategy for growing and attracting traffic to the website. He attributes much of his professional successes to his philosophy degree from Drexel.
“Although I have developed a fairly technical skillset, I regularly work with computer scientists and developers who have more technical ability than I do. Being able to clearly communicate technical concepts and findings to an audience who may have different contexts for that sort of conversation has provided me with many opportunities I otherwise would not have had. Effective communication of complex ideas has definitely set me apart.”
Additionally, Harrison is proud of the work he has done with the Democratic party wards in Philadelphia, where he provides an analytical look at voter turnouts by city ward and division to help party leaders devise strategies to mobilize the vote in the very important coming elections.