Chiara Gastaldi is a PhD Candidate in Economics and Finance at the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, Italy. She holds an MA in Applied Economics from the Catholic University of America in Washington DC and an MSc in International Relations from Ca’ Foscari University of Venice. She has also been trained in applied econometrics and impact evaluation methods by research institutions and international organizations such as the World Bank Development Impact Evaluation (DIME) group.

Her research lies at the intersection of economics of education and gender, with a particular focus on how school-to-work transitions and childcare policies influence gender disparities in the labor market. Current projects include a large-scale Randomized Controlled Trial in South Tyrolean schools evaluating the effect of AI-powered role models on students’ aspirations and gender attitudes toward STEM, and a study on the impact of regional autonomy in Italy on early childhood education provision.

Gastaldi has interned at the OECD’s Center for Entrepreneurship, SMEs, Regions and Cities - Spatial Productivity Lab in Trento where she conducted advanced econometric analyses, stakeholder focus groups and contributed to OECD policy publications. She is collaborating on a project with the Research Institute for the Evaluation of Public Policies (IRVAPP) at the Bruno Kessler Foundation in Trento (Italy). Earlier, she was a Test Development Associate at Cambium Learning (Washington, D.C.), working on data integrity and assessment development for U.S. public schools, and a University Lecturer in the School of Arts and Sciences at the Catholic University of America.