Paul Hilliard is a principal research data analyst in the ETS Research Institute. He received a B.A. in mathematics from Arcadia University in 2003 and an M.S. in applied statistics from Villanova University in 2016. In his current role at ETS, he is an analyst for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). He served as the lead or co-analyst for several recent nationwide assessments, including the 2017 writing assessment, 2019 and 2022 Science assessments, and the 2021 Long Term Trend assessment (LTT). He has assisted with operational reading and mathematics assessments as well as various pilots, special studies, and assorted projects. As an analyst, he assists and collaborates with psychometricians and researchers inside and outside ETS. He also prepares analyses and summaries for external publication and presentation. In recent years, he has assisted the Automated Scoring group in developing and evaluating the quality and precision of automated scoring models for the e-rater automated scoring engine. He also was a senior analyst for the 2018 and 2022 iterations of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA).
Prior to joining ETS, he worked at a for-profit educational services company as a statistical assistant/psychometrics assistant. In this role, he was a senior member of a team that built and evaluated automated essay scoring models and developed computerized adaptive testing item bank files containing item response theory, 3-parameter statistics.
After graduation from Arcadia University in 2003, he was a secondary mathematics teacher with experience teaching prealgebra through precalculus.
Last updated: 2/27/2026