Khalisa Phillips, PhD, CPSI

 Dr. Khalisa Phillips is a leading expert in child development, human factors and consumer product safety. With doctoral and masters degrees from the University of Maryland and Harvard University, Khalisa specializes in product design, marketing, and regulatory compliance for toys, playground equipment, and children's products. 

Khalisa's practice builds on a distinguished 14-year career at the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) within the Division of Human Factors. During her tenure as a children's product subject matter expert (SME), her technical assessments directly informed many nationwide product recalls and shaped federal safety enforcement.

At CPSC, Khalisa co-managed the regulated age determination program, defended government findings in contested compliance cases, and managed critical research contracts on playground surfacing performance, and child-toy interactions. She was a co-editor of the 2020 CPSC Age Determination Guidelines and was a principal contributor to the 2025 Public Playground Safety Handbook.  In 2020, Khalisa briefed the Commission an overview of the updated CPSC Age Determination Guidelines, and presented an overview of the new Guidelines to Toy Fair International. She led multiple trainings for CPSC staff on age grading.  Khalisa served as the CPSC delegate to ASTM for children’s playgrounds and infant sleep products. While at CPSC, Khalisa engaged with external stakeholders in the playground and toy industry. She presented a poster at The Association for the Study of Play, visited a major toy manufacturer's human factors research facility, and toured several nature playgrounds.

Khalisa continues to be actively involved in consumer product safety through ASTM International. She currently leads an F15 home playgrounds task group, and participates in multiple F15 subcommittees including toys, public playground equipment, and wearable infant sleep products. Khalisa was a recent panelist on age grading at the 2026 Annual Meeting for the International Consumer Product Health and Safety Organization (ICPHSO). She maintains memberships with the Society for Product Safety Professionals (SPSP) and the National Recreation and Park Association (NRPA). She is a credentialed Certified Playground Safety Investigator (CPSI).