Ayesha Islam is a policy analyst in the Income and Benefits Policy Center at the Urban Institute, where she focuses on racial equity challenges and workforce development. Her research has explored immigration and race, local economic mobility and place-based initiatives, mental health needs of vulnerable populations, remote service delivery for young people, apprenticeships for transitioning veterans, and more. She also coleads Urban’s Structural Racism Project, an internal capacity-building initiative that helps researchers better analyze and write about policy in the context of structural racism. Before joining Urban, Islam served as a New York City Urban Fellow for the NYC Department of Small Business Services, where she supported the creation of programs such as Black Entrepreneurs NYC to reduce racial disparities in economic opportunity. Islam graduated with a bachelor’s degree in political science from Bryn Mawr College.