Cara Weiss

Cara Weiss’s work focuses on improving the quality and standardization of data in federal reporting systems to support monitoring, research, and analytics for Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). She has expertise in designing solutions that improve data quality and bridge the gap between policy, data, and technical specifications for data reporting systems.

Weiss is currently the deputy project director of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) 1115 Demonstration Support Contract, which provides CMS with several types of technical assistance related to Medicaid section 1115 demonstrations. In this role, she oversees teams that provide technical assistance to CMS and states for 1115 demonstrations, including those that affect beneficiary eligibility and coverage, as well as address substance use disorders and serious mental illness/serious emotional disturbance. She oversaw the development of performance metrics and reporting templates for states with demonstrations that effect eligibility and coverage. Previously, Weiss led initiatives to detect and improve the quality of state-submitted Medicaid and CHIP administrative data to support research and analytics. Weiss has also been involved in supporting CMS’s Medicaid information management strategy to develop an enterprise system to collect, store, and analyze Medicaid and CHIP program and administrative data. This work included assessing legacy systems for future realignment and migration, developing data governance plans, and contributing to the design of a conceptual application architecture.

She holds an M.S. in statistics from Rutgers University.