Craig Helmstetter, Managing Partner

Email: info@apmresearchlab.org
Phone: 651.290.1219
LinkedIn, Threads

Craig Helmstetter, Ph.D., is the APM Research Lab’s founding Managing Partner. Under Helmstetter’s leadership the Lab has become a one-of-a-kind data journalism hub for American Public Media Group – including its Marketplace, Minnesota Public Radio News and LAist newsrooms – and beyond. The Lab’s award-winning research and journalism has been cited hundreds of times in outlets ranging from hyper-local to international in scope. Helmstetter has developed on-going research partnerships with Universities and project-specific collaborations to help execute a variety of investigative journalism projects. He also provides day-to-day leadership of the Research Lab, directing the overall agenda, providing hands-on analysis and editing, and he has authored or coauthored well over 100 articles.

Helmstetter is a member of both the American Association for Public Opinion Research, where he serves on the Transparency Initiative Coordinating Committee, and the American Sociological Association. Helmstetter joined American Public Media from Wilder Research, where he was the founding project director of Minnesota’s Homeless Management Information System and where he helped to establish and then lead the Minnesota Compass initiative. He holds both a master’s degree in Community and Regional Planning and a Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Oregon.

Craig lives outside of Minneapolis where he enjoys running, skiing, and spending time with friends and family.

READ CRAIG’S WORK HERE

Alyson Clary, Senior Research Analyst

Email: aclary@apmresearchlab.org
Phone: 651.290.1092

Alyson joined the Lab as Senior Research Analyst in 2019 as a Mellon/ACLS Public Fellow, and she has continued at the Lab since the end of her postdoctoral fellowship. Alyson has authored articles on education, health, housing, politics and public policy. She has contributed data analysis and visualizations to coverage in partnership with Minnesota Public Radio News and Marketplace, including the latter’s award-winning Season 6 of The Uncertain Hour: The Welfare-to-Work Industrial Complex. Her work on tax forfeiture in Minnesota and its impact on county revenue, in partnership with MPR News and APM Reports, won a 2023 Eric Severeid Award for Investigative Journalism from the Midwest Broadcast Journalists Association. 

In addition to her data journalism, Alyson has contributed to source and staff diversity tracking efforts across the American Public Media Group, serving as lead author on the LAist’s publicly available 2024 staff diversity report. Alyson holds a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from Emory University.

READ ALYSON’S WORK HERE

Elisabeth Gawthrop, Data Journalist & Digital Specialist

Email: egawthrop@apmresearchlab.org
Phone: 651.290.1246

Elisabeth is a data journalist from Indianapolis. Before joining the Lab, she was a reporting fellow for Columbia Journalism Investigations and a freelance data journalist and fact checker. She was part of the team behind Columbia and the Center for Public Integrity’s series “Hidden Epidemics”, which won first place for public health reporting (large newsroom) in the 2020 Association of Health Care Journalists awards. She loves diving into the details in data reporting, as well as using a solutions lens in investigative projects.

Elisabeth also has a decade of experience in researching and communicating climate science and international development. She holds a bachelor’s in environmental science from Indiana University and master’s degrees in investigative journalism and climate and society from Columbia University.

READ ELISABETH’S WORK HERE

Maya Chari, Data Journalism Fellow

Email: mchari@apmresearchlab.org
LinkedIn

Maya Chari is the APM Research Lab’s 2024 Ten Across Data Journalism Fellow. She has roots in Louisiana and North Carolina, and holds a bachelor’s degree in computer science and history from the University of North Carolina. In 2024, she received her MFA in fiction writing from Arizona State University. She has worked extensively as a ghostwriter for trade publications, focusing on issues of energy and automation. She previously served as an editor for Hayden’s Ferry Review and has taught English composition and introductory computer science. Maya lives in Phoenix, Arizona. When not writing, she enjoys cooking and moderate-difficulty hikes.

READ MAYA’S WORK HERE