Appendix C
Participant Biographies
Amina Abubakar, Ph.D., studied educational psychology at Kenyatta University in Kenya, before proceeding to study Developmental Cross-Cultural Psychology at Tilburg University where she obtained her Ph.D. in 2008. She currently works at the Kenya Medical Research Institute/ Wellcome Trust Research Programme, in Kenya. She is also a visiting academic at Tilburg University, the Netherlands and University of Oxford, UK. Her research concerns three broad areas: examining the sequelae of various childhood diseases, neurodevelopmental disorders, specifically autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) and contextual predictors of mental health among adolescents across cultural contexts. Her main interests are in the study of developmental delays and impairments among children exposed to various health problems such as HIV, malnutrition and malaria. Her main focus in this regard is on developing culturally appropriate strategies for identifying, monitoring and rehabilitating at-risk children. Alongside her colleagues, Dr. Abubakar has been instrumental in developing various culturally appropriate measures of child development currently in use in almost 10 African countries. She has also been involved in various projects aimed at examining the psychosocial risk factors (i.e., maternal depression, quality of home environment, and parental socioeconomic status) predictive of poor developmental outcome among vertically infected HIV positive children and adolescents. In addition, she is also interested in examining the prevalence of and risk factors for neurodevelopmental disorders, specifically ASD, within the African context. As part of her post-doctoral work in cross-cultural psychology,
she has recently completed a study involving more than 7,000 adolescents and emerging adults from 24 countries, where she investigates how various contextual factors (familial, school, peer, and cultural) impact on well-being (mental health and life satisfaction identity formation). Dr. Abubakar has given guest lectures, and workshops largely focusing on cross-cultural research methods in various countries, including Cameroon, Germany, Indonesia, Kenya, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Africa, and Spain. She has (co)-authored several peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters.
Constanza Alarcón, is a Psychologist at the National University of Colombia, and she has a degree in Special Education and Integral Social Attention in Mental Health. She also received a master’s degree in Social and Educational Development and received a certificate for Early Childhood Education at Israel’s Golda Meir Mount Carmel International Training Center.
Dr. Alarcón currently works with the Presidency of the Colombian Republic in the Presidential Office for Special Programs as the National Coordinator of the Inter-Sectoral Commission for Early Childhood. She served as the Deputy Director of the Childhood Attention Department of the Local Secretary for Social Integration and worked as an advisor on cooperation and social organizations strengthening issues for the Mayor of Bogotá. In the academic field, she has been Dean of Education Faculties as well as professor at both undergraduate and graduate levels for a number of universities in Colombia. For more than 15 years, she has been working in child education teacher training. Dr. Alarcón has also coordinated protection, adoption, and attention programs for disabled populations.
Jere R. Behrman, Ph.D., is the WR Kenan, Jr. Professor of Economics and Sociology and Population Studies Center Research Associate at the University of Pennsylvania. His research is in empirical micro economics, economic development, early childhood development, labor economics, human resources (education, training, health, nutrition), economic demography, household behaviors, life-cycle and intergenerational relations, and policy evaluation. He has published more than 370 professional articles (primarily in leading general and field economic journals, also in leading demographic, sociology, nutritional, and biomedical journals) and 34 books. He has been a research consultant with numerous international organizations, involved in professional research or lecturing in more than 40 countries, principal investigator (PI) on more than 75 research projects and received various honors for his research, including being selected as Fellow of the Econometric Society, a 40th Anniversary Fulbright Fellow,
the 2008 biennial Carlos Diaz-Alejandro Prize for outstanding research contributions to Latin America, a 2011 Doctor Honoris Causa from the University de Chile, and a member of the U.S. National Institutes of Child Health and Development (NICHD) Advisory Council. He currently is PI on The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Grand Challenges Canada grants and an investigator on two NICHD projects studying early childhood development.
Zulfiqar A. Bhutta, MBBS, FRCPCH, FAAP, Ph.D., is the Robert Harding Inaugural Chair in Global Child Health at the Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, the co-Director of the SickKids center for Global Child Health and the Founding Director of the Center of Excellence in Women and Child Health, at the Aga Khan University, unique joint appointments. He also holds adjunct professorships at the Schools of Public Health at Johns Hopkins (Baltimore), Tufts University (Boston), University of Alberta, and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. He is a designated Distinguished National Professor of the Government of Pakistan and was the Founding Chairman of the National Research Ethics Committee of the Government of Pakistan from 2002–2014. Dr. Bhutta’s research interests include newborn and child survival, maternal and child undernutrition, and micronutrient deficiencies. Dr. Bhutta is one of the seven-member Independent Expert Review Group (iERG) established by the UN Secretary General in September 2011 for monitoring global progress in maternal and child health Millenium Development Goals. He represents the global academic and research organizations on the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunizations (GAVI) Board, is the co-Chair of the Maternal and Child Health oversight committee of WHO Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office (EMRO) as well as the Global Countdown to 2015 Steering Group. He has served as a member of the Global Advisory Committee for Health Research for WHO, the Board of Child & Health and Nutrition Initiative of Global Forum for Health Research, and was a founding Board member of the Global Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (PMNCH). He serves on several international editorial boards. Dr. Bhutta is currently a member of the WHO Strategic Advisory Committee for Vaccines (SAGE), the Expert Advisory Group for Vaccine Research, the Advisory Committee for Health Research of WHO EMRO, and a co-chair of its apex Regional Committee for Maternal and Child Health. He has won several awards, including the Aga Khan University Awards for Research (2005) Distinguished Faculty (2012), and the WHO Family Health Award (2014). Professor Bhutta received his Ph.D. from the Karolinska Institute, Sweden, and is a Fellow of the Royal College of Paediatrics & Child Health, American Academy of Pediatrics, and the Pakistan Academy of Sciences.
Donald A. P. Bundy, Ph.D., is the World Bank’s Lead Specialist for Health, Nutrition and Population in the Africa Region and serves as Coordinator of the African Programme for Onchocerciasis Control (APOC). Before joining the World Bank, he was Professor of Epidemiology at Oxford University, and is currently visiting professor at George Washington University, Imperial College (London), and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. He has worked in the field of international child health and development for 30 years and was the founder of the Partnership for Child Development, a civil society organization that promotes health and education in more than 50 countries. He is an editor for the Disease Control Priorities, Third Edition, and is also the Lead Editor of the new Volume 3 on Child and Adolescent Development. He has authored more than 350 publications, including 3 best-selling books, and has twice been awarded the prestigious Council on International Nontheatrical Events (CINE) Golden Eagle for his work in documentary film making, which includes the award-winning PBS series Behind the Crisis.
Claudia Cappa, Ph.D., is currently working as Statistics Specialist in the Data and Analytics Section, Division of Policy and Practice, at UNICEF headquarters. She is the focal point for data collection, data analysis, and methodological work on early childhood development, child disability and child protection from violence, exploitation, and abuse. The support for these activities includes elaboration of survey questionnaires and data collection tools, data analysis, production of reports, as well as delivery and dissemination of final results. In this capacity, she has been responsible for the preparation of a number of data-driven publications, including the recent UNICEF reports on birth registration (Every Child’s Birth Right: Inequities and Trends in Birth Registration) and FGM/C (Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting: A Statistical Overview and Exploration of the Dynamics of Change). Prior to joining UNICEF, she was working at the University of Geneva and at the Institute for Social Studies of the International Labour Organization. Dr. Cappa holds an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Development Studies from the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Switzerland.
Maysoun Chehab is an Education Specialist and a Global Leader for Young Children. She has an M.Ed. in Special Education, and a B.A. in Child and Family Counseling from the University of Michigan, and is certified as an Inclusion Specialist. Chehab is the Basic Education Programme Consultant for UNESCO, Beirut Regional Office and the Global Leaders’ Regional Coordinator in the Arab States. In 2014 she joined the International Network for Education in Emergencies as the Arabic Community Language Facilitator. Chehab has developed and managed education pro-
grams in many countries, including Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen. Her professional interest is mainly in program and policy planning and advocacy for quality education.
Mickey Chopra, Ph.D., took up his post as Chief of Health and Associate Director of Programmes at UNICEF’s New York Headquarters in August 2009, leading the agency’s work on maternal, newborn and child health, immunization, pediatric HIV/AIDS, and health systems strengthening, policy and research. Prior to his appointment to UNICEF, Dr. Chopra was the director of the Health Systems Research Group of the South Africa Medical Research Council.
Dr. Chopra is qualified as a medical doctor with an additional degree in medical sociology from the University of Southampton in England. After completing his internship, he went to work as a district medical officer in the rural health district of Hlabisa, South Africa. He had a particular focus on child health and nutrition programmes and received his Diploma in Child Health during this time.
After receiving his master’s in public health (Primary Health in Developing Countries) at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in 1997, he joined the nascent School of Public Health at the University of the Western Cape in South Africa. In 2008, he earned his Ph.D. from Faculty of Medicine, University of Uppsala in Sweden.
Dr. Chopra has published more than 120 international peer-reviewed papers and contributed to numerous book chapters concerned with international child health and nutrition.
Tarun Dua, Ph.D., is currently a Medical Officer at WHO, contributing to many of the department’s work in the area of neurological disorders. She was the project manager for many of the department’s key publications, such as mhGAP Intervention Guide for Management of Mental, Neurological and Substance Use Disorders in Non-Specialized Settings (including developmental and behavioral disorders). She focused on the development of mhGAP guidelines on mental, neurological, and substance use disorders and neonatal seizure guidelines using GRADE methodology. She is also an editor of the volume of mental, neurological, and substance use disorders of the latest edition of Disease Control Priorities in Developing Countries currently being prepared for publication in 2015.
After completing her postgraduate training and residency, Dr. Dua worked as a Senior Research Officer at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, India, where she was one of the editors for a review of published and unpublished reports of programs related to neonatal and child health in India. During her tenure as Senior Research Associate in Child Neurology at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi,
she established the Child Development Clinic and was involved in running of Neurology Clinic and Neuromuscular Clinic. Dr. Dua organized the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Expert Group Meeting for Reduction of Childhood Neuromorbidity in India. She was one of the editors for the Training Module for Childhood Neurological Disorders, which was widely circulated in the SAARC region. She worked as a Senior Lecturer in University of Delhi, India, from 2001 through 2004. Dr. Dua was also responsible for clinical work and research in addition to teaching undergraduate and post-graduate students in Pediatrics with specific focus on child neurology. She completed a research project to establish norms of plantar reflex in Indian infants. She was the Supervisor for a research studentship of the Indian Council of Medical Research for the project titled “Etiology of Neonatal Seizures in a Tertiary Health Care Centre.” Additionally, she was a co-investigator in a multi micronutrient supplementation trial of malnourished pregnant women to see the effect on birth weight and early neonatal outcome.
Maureen Durkin, Ph.D., Dr.P.H., M.P.H., is Professor of Population Health Sciences and Pediatrics and a Waisman Center investigator at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She is also vice chair of the department and director of the graduate program in population health sciences. Dr. Durkin received her undergraduate degree and Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and her M.P.H. and Dr.P.H. degrees in epidemiology from Columbia University. Her research interests include the epidemiology, prevention, antecedents and consequences of neurodevelopmental disabilities and childhood injuries, both globally and within the United States. She has collaborated in the development of cross-cultural methods for screening for developmental disabilities and methods for surveillance of childhood injuries, and has directed international studies of the prevalence and causes of neurodevelopmental disabilities in low-income countries. She has also directed a cohort study of neuropsychological outcomes of neonatal brain injuries associated with preterm birth and with metabolic disorders detected on newborn screening, and is currently the principal investigator on the Wisconsin Surveillance of Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities System.
Parfait Eloundou-Enyegue, Ph.D., is Professor of Development Sociology, Cornell University. His areas of research interest cover broad questions related to children, schooling, inequality, and African development, including contemporary transitions in education and family systems, and the role of population change in these transformations. He is interested in microlevel studies and macrolevel analyses of the impacts of changing family environments on the development of African children. He has
published scientific work on these topics and currently leads an international panel of researchers studying the implications of contemporary demographic change in sub-Saharan Africa. He is Associate Editor of Demographic Research, and he sits of the Board of Directors of the Population Reference Bureau, the Guttmacher Institute, the Population Association of America, and the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population.
Lia Fernald, Ph.D., MBA, is Associate Professor in Community Health and Human Development at the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Fernald’s work has focused primarily on how inequalities in socioeconomic position contribute to growth and developmental outcomes in mothers, infants, and children, and on how interventions can address socioeconomic and health disparities. Much of her work for the past decade has centered on looking at the effects of interventions (e.g., conditional cash transfer programs, parenting programs, micro-credit interventions, and community-based nutrition interventions) on child development and maternal mental health, particularly focused on low- and middle-income countries. Dr. Fernald has published more than 70 academic articles and book chapters in journals such as Lancet, Pediatrics, International Journal of Epidemiology, Journal of Health Economics, Social Science and Medicine, American Journal of Public Health, and Developmental Science; she also acts as an Associate Editor for Public Health Nutrition.
Michael Georgieff, M.D., is an internationally recognized expert on fetal and neonatal nutritional risk factors to the developing brain. His career in this area has spanned more than 25 years and includes investigations of memory function in humans and in rodent models. His scientific approaches range from conditional gene knock-out mouse models to human behavior. He received his B.A. in Psychology at Yale University in 1975 and his M.D. at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. He did his post-doctoral work at the University of Pennsylvania and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. He joined the Pediatric faculty at the University of Minnesota in 1985 and the Institute of Child Development in 1997. He is currently the Martin Lenz Harrison Land Grant Professor of Pediatrics, the head of the Section of Neonatology, and the Vice Chair of the Department of Pediatrics. He co-founded and directs the University of Minnesota’s Center for Neurobehavioral Development, an interdisciplinary research center with 40 faculty members from 11 departments and 5 schools. He serves as an advisor to the Pediatric Nutrition Branch of NICHD. He has published more than 160 research papers and has had continuous NIH funding for 20 years.
Paul Gertler, Ph.D., is the Li Ka Shing Foundation Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where he holds appointments in the Haas School of Business and the School of Public Health. Dr. Gertler was Chief Economist of the Human Development Network of the World Bank from 2004–2007 and the Founding Chair of the Board of Directors of the International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie) from 2009–2012. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin and has held faculty appointments at Harvard University and RAND. He was awarded the Kenneth Arrow Award in health economics in 1996, an academic Leadership Award by NIH in 1998, a Research Medal in Economic Development by the Global Development Network in 2002, and The Juan Jose Bobadilla Medal for Global Health in 2013. He has been a PI of a large number of impact evaluations, including Mexico’s CCT program PROGRESA/ OPORTUNIDADES, Rwanda’s Health Care Pay for Performance scheme and Argentina’s Plan Nacer. He has published extensively in both scientific and policy journals on early childhood development, education, health, HIV/AIDS, energy and climate change, housing, job training, poverty alleviation, labor markets, and water and sanitation.
Gillian Huebner is a Senior Advisor for Child Development and Protection at USAID’s Center of Excellence on Children in Adversity. She has worked with an interagency team to develop and coordinate implementation of the U.S. Government Action Plan on Children in Adversity, which was launched from the White House in December 2012. The U.S. government’s whole-of-government approach to children is mandated by Public Law 109-95: The Assistance to Orphans and Other Vulnerable Children in Developing Countries Act of 2005. Her previous experience includes work with the United Nations as well as with nongovernmental organizations and academic institutions in six countries in Africa, the former Soviet Union, Western Europe, and the United States. She served as a UN humanitarian affairs officer in Angola during the past 3 years of the civil war and has designed conflict resolution and child rights programs with Search for Common Ground and Save the Children. Ms. Huebner has taught courses in field research and cross-cultural communication with World Learning’s School for International Training in Russia and has been involved in a working group on psychosocial support in crisis settings. She received her B.A. from Bard College and a master’s degree in social sciences from the University of Amsterdam.
Patricia Kariger, Ph.D., is an independent consultant and researcher at the University of California, Berkeley, with more than 15 years of experience in measuring early child development in the context of large health, nutrition and preschool studies. As part of a Cornell University/UNI-
CEF team, she helped produce a brief, survey-level measure of household factors important for child development (now part of the Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys). She has experience adapting early development and household environment measures for use in Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Dr. Kariger has worked as a consultant with the World Bank, USAID, the Aga Khan Foundation, the Inter-American Development Bank, Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition, and Action Against Hunger. She holds a Ph.D. in Human Development from the University of California, Davis.
Sunita Kishor, Ph.D., is the Director of the DHS Program, the leading nationally representative household survey program for developing countries since 1984. In addition to other demographic and health indicators, the USAID-funded program also collects information on child health, nutrition, and well-being. Dr. Kishor herself has expertise in questionnaire development and survey implementation. She was co-manager for the India DHS surveys, the largest of all DHS surveys. She is also a widely known gender specialist with more than two decades of experience in conducting research on the interface between gender and health in developing countries. Dr. Kishor has worked for the DHS Program since 1993 and has supported the development of special modules on gender-based violence and women’s status.
Ramanan Laxminarayan, Ph.D., is Vice-President for Research and Policy at the Public Health Foundation of India. He is an economist and epidemiologist by training. His research work deals with the integration of epidemiological models of infectious diseases and drug resistance into the economic analysis of public health problems. Through his work on Extending the Cure project in the United States and the Global Antibiotic Resistance Partnership, he has worked to improve the understanding of antibiotic resistance as a problem of managing a shared global resource. He has worked extensively with WHO, the World Bank, and other international organizations on evaluating malaria treatment policy, vaccination strategies, the economic burden of tuberculosis, and control of noncommunicable diseases. Dr. Laxminarayan is an editor of the Disease Control Priorities for Developing Countries, 3rd edition. He has served on a number of advisory committees at WHO, CDC, and the U.S. National Academy of Sciences/IOM. In 2003–2004, he served on the IOM Committee on the Economics of Anti-Malarial Drugs and subsequently helped create the Affordable Medicines Facility for malaria, a novel financing mechanism for antimalarials. He has co-authored and edited 5 books and published more than 80 peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Laxminarayan also directs the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics & Policy in
Washington, DC, and is a Research Scholar and Lecturer at Princeton University.
Joan Lombardi, Ph.D., is an international expert on child development and social policy. She currently serves as Senior Advisor to the Buffett Early Childhood Fund on national initiatives and to the Bernard van Leer Foundation on global child development strategies. She also directs Early Opportunities, LLC, focusing on innovation, policy, and philanthropy. Over the past 40 years, Dr. Lombardi has made significant contributions in the areas of child and family policy as an innovative leader and policy advisor to national and international organizations and foundations and as a public servant. She served in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services as the first Deputy Assistant Secretary for Early Childhood Development (2009–2011) in the Obama administration, and as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy and External Affairs in Administration for Children and Families and the first Commissioner of the Child Care Bureau among other positions (l993–1998) during the Clinton administration. Outside of public service, she served as the founding chair of the Birth to Five Policy Alliance (now the Alliance for Early Success) and as the founder of Global Leaders for Young Children. She currently serves on the Board of Trustees for Save the Children and the Board of Directors for the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning.
Kofi Marfo, Ph.D., is Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of South Florida, Tampa, and newly appointed Director of the Institute for Human Development at Aga Khan University (Pakistan-East Africa, effective June 2014). He was the Founding Director of the Center for Research on Children’s Development and Learning at the University of South Florida from 2000 to 2007. With current interests in developmental science and childhood interventions, the advancement of a global science of human development, and philosophical issues in behavioral science and education research, he has published extensively in the areas of early child development, early intervention efficacy, parent–child interaction, behavioral development in children adopted from China, and childhood disability in low- and middle-income countries. His scholarship has been cited across disciplines in more than 180 different journals worldwide. He is co-leader of an initiative to support child development research capacity-building in Africa and is a co-convener of the African Scholars in Child/Early Child Development Workshop series. He is a member of the Society for Research in Child Development, the International Society for the Study of Behavioral Development, and the American
Educational Research Association. He has been a U.S. National Academy of Education Spencer Fellow, a Zero to Three Irving B. Harris Mid-Career Leadership Fellow, and more recently a Residential Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University. He was, for 4 years, a member of NICHD’s Bio-Behavioral and Behavioral Sciences Subcommittee. He is a member of the Governing Council of the Society for Research in Child Development and serves on an Advisory Committee of ELMA Philanthropies, USA. He is a graduate of the University of Alberta, Canada (M.E. and Ph.D.), and the University of Cape Coast, Ghana (B.Ed., Honors).
Ann S. Masten, Ph.D., LP, is the Irving B. Harris Professor of Child Development and Distinguished McKnight University Professor in the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota. She completed her doctoral training at the University of Minnesota in clinical psychology and an internship at the University of California, Los Angeles. In 1986, she joined the faculty in the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota, serving as chair of the department from 1999 to 2005. Dr. Masten’s research focuses on understanding processes that promote competence and prevent problems in human development, with a focus on adaptive processes and pathways, developmental tasks and cascades, and resilience in the context of high cumulative risk, adversity, and trauma. She directs the Project Competence studies of risk and resilience, including studies of normative populations and high-risk young people exposed to war, natural disasters, poverty, homelessness, and migration. The ultimate objective of her research is to inform sciences, practices, and policies that aim to promote positive development and a better future for children and families whose lives are threatened by adversity. Dr. Masten currently serves on the Board on Children, Youth, and Families (BCYF) and the U.S. National Committee of Psychology for the IOM/National Academies, and formerly served on the BCYF Committee on the Impact of Mobility and Change on the Lives of Young Children, Schools, and Neighborhoods and planning committee on Investing in Young Children Globally. She also has served as President of the Society for Research in Child Development and President of Division 7 (Developmental) of the American Psychological Association (APA). She is a 2014 recipient of the Urie Bronfenbrenner Award for Lifetime Contributions to Developmental Psychology in the Service of Science and Society from APA. Dr. Masten has published and presented extensively on the themes of risk and resilience in human development. Her book Ordinary Magic: Resilience in Children will be published in 2014 by Guilford Press.
Chloe O’Gara, Ph.D., is a program officer in the Global Development and Population Program at The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, responsible for the Foundation’s grants to strengthen Women’s Economic Empowerment. The portfolio includes an emphasis on caregivers, paid and unpaid, and the impacts of child care in the lives of women and children. Before joining the Foundation, Dr. O’Gara served as the associate vice president for education and child development at Save the Children International, where she was responsible for programs, advocacy, and investments to improve basic education and human development of marginalized children around the world.
Atif Rahman, Ph.D., is professor of child psychiatry at the University of Liverpool and chairs the academic child mental health unit at the Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool. He is a Visiting Professor at the Institute of Psychiatry, Rawalpindi, Pakistan, and an Honorary Director of the Research NGO, the Human Development Research Foundation, Pakistan. Dr. Rahman leads the Global Mental Health research group at the Institute of Psychology, Health and Society at the University of Liverpool. Dr. Rahman’s research, funded through successive Wellcome Trust Fellowships, has focused on the epidemiology of maternal mental health, the impact of maternal depression on child health and development, and community-based psychosocial interventions for maternal and child mental health in low-income settings. He currently leads three multisite trials in South Asia focusing on the integrated delivery of mental health interventions through non-specialists. He is PI, with Vikram Patel, of the South Asian Hub for Research, Advocacy and Education in mental health, a 5-year program funded by NIH in the United States. He divides his time between the United Kingdom and South Asia, where most of his research is based.
Abbie Raikes, Ph.D., is a programme specialist in early childhood care and education at UNESCO, Paris. Prior to joining UNESCO, Dr. Raikes served as a senior officer of impact planning and improvement at The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in Seattle, Washington, where her work focused on strategy development and measurement in global health and education, including early childhood. Dr. Raikes’ background in early childhood is extensive, and spans early childhood programs, research, and policy. Her experience includes positions as a quality improvement evaluator for early childhood programs, a home visitor for infants and toddlers, and several years in university-based research and teaching. She holds a Ph.D. in developmental psychology and a master’s degree in population and family health.
Norbert Schady, Ph.D., is the Principal Economic Advisor for the Social Sector at the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). He holds a bachelor’s degree from Yale University and a Ph.D. from Princeton University. In addition to the IDB, Dr. Schady has worked at the World Bank and UNICEF, and has taught at Georgetown and Princeton. His main research areas include early childhood development, cash transfer programs, and the effects of economic crises on the accumulation of human capital. Dr. Schady has published 2 books and more than 25 articles in academic journals in economics, political science, and health, and he has extensive experience advising governments in Latin America, Europe, Asia, and Africa.
Robert Serpell, Ph.D., has spent most of his adult life in Zambia. Born and raised in England, in 1965 he graduated from Oxford and joined the founding staff of the University of Zambia. In 1979 he became a citizen of Zambia, where all his children were born and raised.
Formerly Director, University of Zambia’s Institute for African Studies (1977–1983), Director, Graduate Studies program in Applied Developmental Psychology, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, USA (1989–2001), and Vice-Chancellor, University of Zambia (2003–2006), he is currently Professor of Psychology at the University of Zambia, and Coordinator of the Centre for Promotion of Literacy in Sub-Saharan Africa.
His publications include contributions to a wide range of scholarly journals and edited volumes, and four books: Culture’s Influence on Behaviour (1976), Mobilizing Local Resources in Africa for Persons with Learning Difficulties or Mental Handicap (1984), The Significance of Schooling: Life-Journeys in an African Society (1993), and Becoming Literate in the City: The Baltimore Early Childhood Project (2005). His primary interests are in cultural aspects of human development, intelligence, multilingualism, literacy, assessment and intervention for children with disabilities and their families, and curriculum development, with special attention to cultural context, and to the region of sub-Saharan Africa.
Andy Shih, Ph.D., is Senior Vice President of Scientific Affairs at Autism Speaks. He works closely with members of Autism Speaks’ Board, Scientific Advisory Committee, senior staff and volunteer leadership to develop and implement the organization’s research program. He oversees the etiology portfolio, which includes genetics, environmental sciences, and epidemiology, as well as the Innovative Technology for Autism program, which supports the research and development of novel assistive technologies. Dr. Shih also leads Autism Speaks’ international scientific development efforts, including the Global Autism Public Health Initiative, an international advocacy effort currently active in more than 45 countries around the world that integrates awareness, research, and service
development. His team serves as facilitators and technical advisors to community stakeholders, including government ministries, professional societies, and advocacy organizations. Dr. Shih joined the National Alliance for Autism Research (NAAR) in 2002, an autism science organization that merged with Autism Speaks in 2006. Prior to joining NAAR, he served as an industry consultant and was a member of the faculty at Yeshiva University and New York University Medical Center. Dr. Shih’s research background includes published studies in gene identification and characterization, virus-cell interaction, and cell-cycle regulation. He earned his Ph.D. in cellular and molecular biology from New York University Medical Center.
Peter A. Singer, OC, M.D., M.P.H., FRSC, has dedicated the past decade to bringing science and innovation to tackle the health challenges of the world’s poorest people. He is well known around the world for his creative solutions to some of the most pressing global health problems. Dr. Singer is Chief Executive Officer of Grand Challenges Canada. He is also Director at the Sandra Rotman Centre at University Health Network, Professor of Medicine at University of Toronto, and the Foreign Secretary of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences. Dr. Singer chaired the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences’ assessment on Canada’s Strategic Role in Global Health. He has advised The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the UN Secretary General’s office, the Government of Canada, Pepsico, BioVeda China Venture Capital Fund, and several African Governments on global health.
Dr. Singer was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2011 for his contributions to health research and bioethics, and for his dedication to improving the health of people in developing countries. In 2007, Dr. Singer received the Michael Smith Prize as Canada’s Health Researcher of the Year in Population Health and Health Services. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, the IOM, and The Academy of Sciences for the Developing World.
Dr. Singer has published more than 300 research articles, received more than $50 million in research grants, and mentored hundreds of university students. He co-authored, along with Dr. Abdallah Daar, The Grandest Challenge: Taking Life-Saving Science from Lab to Village. He studied internal medicine at University of Toronto, medical ethics at University of Chicago, public health at Yale University, and management at Harvard Business School.
Ziba Vaghri, Ph.D., is the Director and co-founder of the International Program of Human Early Learning Partnership at the University of Brit-
ish Columbia. Her current interest lies in monitoring the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and Early Child Development across the globe. She ascribes to the view that this type of monitoring has the potential to inform new initiatives in an international context and provide direction to nations wishing to frame future policy around ECD.
Dr. Vaghri has been actively involved in the development of ECRI, designed to facilitate CRC monitoring. She has authored the Manual for General Comment 7 Indicators, spearheaded development of the computerized ECRI, and directed pilot projects of ECRI in Chile and Tanzania.
Dr. Vaghri is a member and co-secretariat of the Global Reference Group for Accountability for Children, supported by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (the Committee). She has a solid history of work with UN agencies such as UNICEF, WHO, UNESCO, the Committee, and serves on a number of international committees, working groups, and Think Tank entities working on child development and child rights issues.
Quentin Wodon, Ph.D., is an Adviser/Lead Economist in the Education Department of the Human Development Network at the World Bank where he serves as cluster leader for equity, resilience, and early childhood development. Previously, he managed the World Bank unit working on faith and development, served as Lead Poverty Specialist for Africa, and as an Economist/Senior Economist for Latin America. Before joining the World Bank, he worked as Assistant Brand Manager for Procter & Gamble Benelux, volunteer corps member and Deputy Director with the International Movement ATD Fourth World, and tenured Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of Namur. He is a fellow with the Institute for the Study of Labor in Bonn, Germany, and the European Center for Advanced Research in Economics and Statistics in Brussels, Belgium, and has taught at Georgetown University and American University in addition to the University of Namur.
Dr. Wodon serves on various advisory boards, as Associate Editor for journals, and is a past President of the Society of Government Economists. He is also actively involved in service work with Rotary and through pro bono consulting for nonprofits. His work focuses on improving policies that can contribute to poverty reduction and development. He has more than 350 publications and is a recipient of the Prize of Belgium’s Secretary of Foreign Trade, a Fulbright grant, and the Dudley Seers Prize. He holds graduate degrees in business engineering, economics, and philosophy (Université Catholique de Louvain), as well as Ph.D.s in Economics (American University) and in Theology and Religious Studies (Catholic University of America).
Hirokazu Yoshikawa, Ph.D., is the Courtney Sale Ross University Professor of Globalization and Education at New York University’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Human Development. He is also the co-chair of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network Workgroup on Early Childhood Development, Education and the Transition to Work, and serves on the Network’s Leadership Council. He is a community and developmental psychologist who studies the effects of public policies and programs related to immigration, early childhood, and poverty reduction on children’s development. He conducts research in the United States and in low- and middle-income countries, including studies on early childhood development and policy in Cambodia, Chile, Colombia, and other countries. His recent books include Immigrants Raising Citizens: Undocumented Parents and Their Young Children (2011, Russell Sage). He has served on the Board on Children, Youth, and Families of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the Early Childhood Advisory Committee of the Inter-American Development Bank, and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Advisory Committee on Head Start Research and Evaluation for the Clinton and Obama administrations. In 2011 he was nominated by President Obama and confirmed by the Senate as a member of the U.S. National Board for Education Sciences. In 2013 he was elected to the National Academy of Education. He obtained his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from New York University.
