Lauren Eyster is a senior research associate in the Income and Benefits Policy Center at the Urban Institute, where her research focuses on innovative workforce development programs and how to best evaluate and learn from them. Most recently, Eyster has examined industry-focused job training and career pathway initiatives implemented through the workforce investment system and at community colleges. She studies how these programs can best provide education and training to different groups such as laid-off workers, youths, low-income people, and older workers. She also researches how systems and various stakeholders can collaborate to help these people find and retain jobs.

Eyster holds an MPP from Johns Hopkins University and a PhD in public policy and administration from the George Washington University.