The 2026 Rising Stars of the Profession: Dr. Mary Catherine Sullivan

Dr. Mary Catherine Sullivan is a Senior Director of Data Science for the Corporate Positioning & Insights practice within FTI Consulting's Strategic Communications segment. As a leader on the data science team, Mary Catherine develops state-of-the-art AI, natural language processing, machine learning, and statistical models to help clients understand the media landscape and support informed decision-making. Her expertise lies in the design, training, and deployment of large language models (LLMs) on diverse datasets in the corporate communications space. Her interest in data science and communications research began while pursuing her doctorate in Political Science. Her dissertation work leveraged natural language processing to study the relationship between political polarization and the social media communication strategies of members of Congress, and her work has been featured by MSNBC, NPR and The New York Times. 

Originally from Dallas, Texas, Mary Catherine earned her B.A. in Government and History from the University of Texas at Austin, graduating Summa Cum Laude. She holds a M.A. and Ph.D. in Political Science and Econometrics from Vanderbilt University. She currently resides in Nashville, Tennessee.