Joanna Lee

Joanna Lee is a Project Manager at the USC Equity Research Center, managing projects and conducting research across ERI’s three areas of work. In addition to authoring reports and supporting quantitative research, one of her main roles at ERI is to lead the team that created and maintains the California Immigrant Data Portal. Joanna is a community-based researcher with nearly two decades of experience in census, redistricting, voting rights, movement building, gentrification in Asian American ethnic enclaves, and demography including disaggregated data on Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islanders. She has produced data and maps to inform community-based advocacy on state and local redistricting efforts, authored demographic reports featuring disaggregated data, analyzed voter files and managed a poll on voter attitudes. Before joining ERI, Joanna worked as a Senior Research Analyst at Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Southern California and Research Director at SCOPE in South Los Angeles. She has produced research for UCLA’s Asian American Studies Center, the Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies, and co-authored a study for Little Tokyo Service Center and Asian Pacific Policy & Planning Council (A3PCON).  She holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Northwestern University and a master’s degree in Urban Planning from the University of California, Los Angeles.