Charity-Joy Acchiardo is a senior fellow at the Civitas Institute. She is also an associate professor of instruction in UT Austin’s Department of Economics. Acchiardo is the faculty lead for UT’s OnRamps economics and civics courses for high school students, and the director of the Financial Responsibility and Economic Education program, both joint projects of the Civitas Institute and the Department of Economics. She is an economic educator fellow at the Fraser Institute, and has served as the executive director of the Journal of Economics Teaching.

Her website econkahoots.com is dedicated to making economics classrooms more engaging. A frequent speaker, both domestically and internationally, Acchiardo shares her passion about economics with others at conferences and workshops for educators and students. She completed her Ph.D. in economics at George Mason University.