The first thing to know about Stacey Gage is that she is both thoughtful and fun-loving. Tulane is lucky to have her as their team leader within MEASURE Evaluation. She grew up in Sierra Leone where she earned a bachelors degree in geography. She studied for her masters degree in Ghana, then moved to the US for a PhD in demography from the University of Pennsylvania.
Before her academic job at Tulane and joining MEASURE Evaluation in 2003, she worked at the Population Council, the United Nations Population Division, Macro International (MEASURE DHS), Pennsylvania State University, USAID/Washington (where she served as Technical Advisor to the DHS through a Public Health Institute fellowship), and the Academy for Educational Development where she was Technical Officer for Performance Monitoring with the BASICS-III project.
Stacey has a son and a daughter. Both are now grown and out of the home, so Stacey and her husband plan to explore the world and discover new passions. When she is not working, Stacey spends her time going to jazz festivals, listening to music and dancing (free style). You can see a 4 minute clip of Stacey being interviewed (no, not dancing) at Tulane here.
Jim
MEASURE Evaluation PRH recently presented a webinar on using a geographic information system (GIS) to link, visualize, and analyze multi-sectoral/multi-program data sources. The webinar focused on the results of a case study conducted in Rwanda in the fall of 2011 to explore data linking opportunities using free and open source GIS software. Achieving long-term Family Planning and Reproductive Health objectives through multi-sectoral and/or multi-program activity integration is a core principle of the Global Health Initiative and can be facilitated by data linking.
The full webinar recording and the presentation slides are available online.
Please share your thoughts on the webinar discussion in the comments section below.
Additional Resources
Child, Caregiver & Household Well-being Survey Tools for Orphans & Vulnerable Children Programs
This manual describes the purpose of the orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) program evaluation tools, including when to use these tools, and how to use the tools. The manual also includes information on how the tools have been used to date, and how data generated from them can be used to support program planning and management. In the appendices, a question-by-question breakdown of all three survey tools is provided.
The manual is available for download on the MEASURE Evaluation web site.
Thoughts?
The description of the person I was going to share with you today isn’t quite ready. So, I am going to give you a window into the networking that happens in MEASURE Evaluation – three conversations happening this week.
On Monday we had our monthly conversation between the MEASURE Evaluation leadership and the USAID management team. The meeting happens both face-to-face and electronically. Those of us in Chapel Hill (usually the UNC senior management team, Scott Moreland [team lead for Future], and Scott McKeown [team lead for MSH]) gather in the basement room where we have two large video screens. One projects a video stream of the USAID team in Washington, and the other shows us what they see of us. Then, joining in on a phone line are the MEASURE Evaluation team leads not in Chapel Hill (usually Ani Hyslop [ICF], Stacey Gage [Tulane], and Stephanie Mullen [JSI]), and any of the USAID team that couldn’t make it to their conference room in Washington. The meeting is technologically complicated, but it usually works. And for those of us in a room with others and able to see the other group in a room, being able to see faces makes it a more rewarding conversation.
Today we are hosting visitors from the West African Health Organization (WAHO), with whom MEASURE Evaluation has collaborated in developing health information systems. The four visitors are in this not-very-good photo I took (I also blanked out some wifi connection info on the board behind them). The man on the far left is their Director General, Dr. Placido Cardoso. We talked in our meeting about our organizations and how we might help each other with our respective missions.
The third networking meeting takes place tomorrow. I will be on the phone with people from FHI 360 – especially the LIFT project that addresses food security – about a conference they are hosting and a presentation they have asked me to give on network analysis.
These are three examples in the span of one week of how the work we do depends heavily on the connections we make with others who are engaged in the same goal of improving global health.
Jim
Overview of Child Status Index Studies
In 2009, MEASURE Evaluation published the Child Status Index: A Tool for Assessing the Well-Being of Orphans and Vulnerable Children, a manual designed to capture vulnerable children’s status across the six domains of the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). Based on anecdotal reports of widespread use, MEASURE Evaluation conducted the Child Status Index Usage Assessment (phase 1) in 2011-2012 to understand how large programs were using the Child Status Index (CSI) to meet a range of information needs. Findings from that study were helpful in understanding the benefits and challenges of using the CSI at the implementing partner level but did not obtain the perspective of community-based workers who use the CSI on a routine basis. In 2012, MEASURE Evaluation conducted a second study, Decision Making Among Community-Based Volunteers Working in Vulnerable Children Programs (phase 2), designed to complement the first study. This document provides an overview of the studies.
Access the full resource on the MEASURE Evaluation web site.
Thoughts?
A Regional Multilevel Analysis: Can Skilled Birth Attendants Uniformly Decrease Neonatal Mortality?
Globally 40% of deaths to children under-five occur in the very first month of life with three-quarters of these deaths occurring during the first week of life. The promotion of delivery with a skilled birth attendant (SBA) is being promoted as a strategy to reduce neonatal mortality. This study explored whether SBAs had a protective effect against neonatal mortality in three different regions of the world.
Access the full abstract and journal article on the MEASURE Evaluation web site.
Thoughts?
Men and Family Planning in Rwanda: What Affects the Integration of Men in Family Planning?
This study was undertaken to understand what affects the integration of men in family planning (FP) in Rwanda, mainly in villages of Southern Province and Kigali City Province. A secondary objective of the study was to identify the factors that facilitate the integration of men in FP services through other services at healthcare facilities such as voluntary counseling and testing (VCT), antiretroviral therapy (ART), prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT), and antenatal care (ANC); and the public’s awareness on this issue.
The full resource is available for download on the MEASURE Evaluation web site.
Thoughts?
