Jim Ellis joined CSR as its Director of Research in 2007 after 20 years at Virginia Commonwealth University's Survey and Evaluation Research Laboratory. He holds Master's degrees in Mass Communications and Survey Methodology and is a Ph.D. candidate in Educational Research and Evaluation at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Education.

While at VCU, Mr. Ellis gained extensive experience managing and directing the Virginia Behavioral Risk Factors Surveillance System under contract with the Virginia Department of Health, and served as senior research associate as well as survey methodologist on projects such as the Richmond City and Chesterfield County Triennial School Census projects, the Virginia Youth Tobacco Survey, and many others. He has presented methodological papers at several annual meetings of the American Association for Public Opinion Research and published in several journals. Mr. Ellis has presented survey results to a number of boards and executive audiences, to members of the Virginia General Assembly, and before former Governor Jim Gilmore and members of his Cabinet. He is currently developing a dissertation about ratings of public school quality in surveys.