Elsa Villa received her PhD in Curriculum and Instruction at New Mexico State University in 2010. She received her bachelor's degree in mathematics and master degrees in computer science and education from The University of Texas at El Paso.

• Ph D in Curriculum and Instruction, New Mexico State University (2010)
• MA in Education, The University of Texas at El Paso (2006)
• MS in Computer Science , The University of Texas at El Paso (1991)
• BS in Mathematics, The University of Texas at El Paso (1967)

• Wrestling with Retention in the CS Major: Report from the ACM Retention Committee Proceedings of the 50th SIGSCE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education 50 (2019), Elsa Villa.
• Navigating hurdles into and through undergraduate engineering and computer science studies Peter Lang Publishing (2018), Elsa Y. Villa, Elaine M. Hampton, Pei-Ling Hsu.
• Retention in Computer Science Undergraduate Programs in the U.S.: Data Challenges and Promising Interventions ACM (2018), Elsa Y. Villa.
• Minority Voices: Interrupting the Social Environment to Retain Undergraduates in Computing Inroads 9/3 (2018), Elsa Villa.
• The Challenges of Tracking and Understanding Student Retention in the CS Major Proceedings of the RESPECT Conference (2018), Chris Stephenson, Lecia Barker, Mehran Sahami, Elsa Y. Villa, Stuart Zweben.

• Transforming Student Learning in Pre-Calculus at a Hispanic Serving Institution on the U.S.-Mexico Border. (2018), Erika L. Mein, Christina Convertino, Elsa Y. Villa, Alberto Esquinca, Diana Camberos, Helena Mucino.
• Influencing culture and curriculum via revolution (2017), Volume Indianapolis, IN, Elsa Y. Villa.
• "You are Leaders": Latinx College Students Learning to Act and Talk like Engineers (2017), Volume El Paso, TX-Cuidad Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico, Alberto Esquinca, Elsa Y. Villa.
• Latinas constructing engineering identities: The role of key people and informal learning activities (2016), Volume Baltimore, MD, Alberto Esquinca, Elsa Y. Villa, Luciene S. Wandermurem, Elaine M. Hampton, Guillermina Nunez-Mchiri.
• Latinas in computer science and engineering: A qualitative study examining identity and agency for resilience and persistence (2015), Volume Washington, D.C., Elsa Y. Villa.

• Building Capacity for Preparing Teacher-Engineers for 21st Century Engineering