Uniting
Research and Policy

Tonanziht Aguas is an MPP student at the Harris School of Public Policy. Her areas of interest include education, labor, and urban policy. Tonanziht currently serves as a Research Fellow for a guaranteed income pilot program in Newark.

Prior to coming to the Harris School of Public Policy, Tonanziht interned at Cooperman College Scholars in Newark, NJ. In this capacity, Tonanziht assisted CCS’ Director of College Success with outreach and support for college-bound Greater Newark youth. Previously, Tonanziht was a policy intern at the New Jersey Office of the Secretary of Higher Education, a fellow at the Center for Security, Race and Rights at the Rutgers Law School, and a higher education policy intern at New America. This year, she is a Research Mentee at the Research in Color Foundation, an organization aimed at increasing the number of PhD students of color in economics and economic-adjacent disciplines. Under the guidance of World Bank economist Dr. Gabriel Englander, she is researching factors relating to food access in New Jersey.

Tonanziht earned her B.A. in economics and political science from Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey - Newark Campus. During her undergraduate years, Tonanziht was anEagleton-Washington Award recipient, a research fellow for the Rutgers International Institute for Peace, and a scholar for the Rutgers Institute for the Study of Global Racial Justice.Tonanziht speaks fluent Spanish and elementary Chinese.