Karen brings more than 18 years of international non-profit and for-profit experience working with top-tier organizations, such as Department of State, USAID, National Democratic Institute, Robert Bosch Foundation, and SAMHSA. 

Karen, as Partner and Head of M&E, specializes in monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL), analytical research, and strategic planning using a systems thinking lens. She has worked closely with governments, donors, and organizations in all stages of the program cycle: including designing and conducting program and portfolio-level evaluations; developing theories of change and strategic frameworks; creating and implementing MEL plans and analytical tools; and providing on-going MEL training and coaching to organizations. She is an expert in a range of quantitative and qualitative evaluation methods and has worked across many sectors, including international human rights, democracy and governance, basic education, health care, and the environment.   

 Some of her prior projects/clients included: 

• Designing and implementing a whole-of-system MEL Plan for a five-year USAID contract focused on elevating the work of USAID’s Office of Education inside and outside the agency

• Conducting process evaluations of two Department of State bureaus with one that examined how their leadership and management curriculum aligned to industry best practices and another that assessed the effectiveness of the evaluation office’s MEL processes. 

• Leading a mixed-method, outcome evaluation of two National Democratic Institute programs, which aimed to strengthen the work of political parties, members of parliament, parliamentary groups, and legislative offices.

• Providing MEL technical assistance and training to a USAID partner implementing a climate change preparedness and resilience program in the Pacific Islands

• Leading a working group and drafting a white paper for SAMHSA that synthesized existing research on the use of peer providers in Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) teams.

Prior to her consulting practice, Karen was a Senior M&E Specialist at Social Solutions International, where she led several international evaluation and analytical research projects.  Before that, she was a Bureau Planning Officer and first Evaluation Specialist at the U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL), where she played an instrumental role in establishing DRL’s utilization-focused and data-driven approach to program. Besides leading and managing a number of internal and external evaluations, she trained and coached 30+ program officers, as well as 40+ grantees, on MEL best practices in international development. 

Karen has worked in Cambodia, Germany, Mali, Pacific Islands, South Korea, Tunisia, and Vietnam and provided in-depth MEL assistance to organizations operating in the Middle East/North Africa, South Asia, and Sub-Saharan Africa. She speaks conversational Mandarin and some Spanish. She has a PhD in Social Psychology from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and BA in Psychology from Pomona College.