Episode 2: The Inclusion Interchange: Tessa Provins, political science researcher and advocate for Indigenous peoples

Tessa Provins is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh. Provins is also one of the organizers of the 2023 Indigenous Cultural Festival at the University of Pittsburgh. 

Her primary research examines the impact of legislative institutional design on the behavior and outcomes for groups divided by party status, gender, and race/ethnicity. She utilizes the variation in institutional designs across American legislative institutions — at the state and local level — to explain how institutional features effect the relationships between party leaders and their members, interactions between political parties, and the ways in which underrepresented groups are incorporated (or not) into the policy making process.

As a member of the Choctaw Nation, she also has research projects investigating the differing legislative structures of Native American Tribal Councils and their effect on intra-tribal, inter-tribal, and government relationships and policy outcomes. Her teaching interests include American politics, race politics, gender politics and quantitative methods.