Lisa Calhoun has nearly 20 years of experience in designing and implementing mixed-methods evaluations and program monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL) systems to improve policies and programs. She has subject matter expertise in sexual and reproductive health and rights, adolescent and youth health, and vectorborne diseases in Africa and South Asia.
At Mathematica, Calhoun leads Mathematica’s work as the measurement and learning partner for the Rockefeller Foundation’s Global Vaccination Initiative, which aims to increase demand for Covid-19 vaccination globally. In addition, Calhoun provides technical assistance and thought leadership to develop and refine MEL frameworks to support implementing the BMGF family planning strategy. Calhoun also recently provided technical input into metric selection and evaluation design for a development investment bond aimed to increase uptake of sexual and reproductive health services from select health facilities among adolescent girls in Kenya.
Previously, Calhoun served as the Deputy Director of the Full Access, Full Choice project at the Carolina Population Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The project aimed to generate and synthesize evidence on expanding contraceptive method choice among youth and included development of a portfolio-level learning agenda, results framework and set of standardized indicators; collection of targeted primary data; and secondary analysis of grantee data to fill key evidence gaps. Additionally, Calhoun served as a Senior Technical Officer on the Measurement, Learning & Evaluation project for the Urban Reproductive Health Initiative which was an impact evaluation of family planning programs in India, Kenya, Nigeria and Senegal, and included collection of longitudinal data from households, women, and health facilities. Calhoun spent several years undertaking research and evaluation of programs aimed to prevent and treat malaria, leishmaniasis, lymphatic filariasis, Chagas disease, guinea worm disease and others in the Caribbean, Latin America and Africa.
Calhoun has published more than 50 peer-reviewed publications in journals such as Reproductive Health, Demography, Plos One, Studies in Family Planning, American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, among other publications. She recently served as a guest editor for Frontiers in Global Women’s Health for a special issue on expanded contraceptive method choice among adolescents and youth. She received a Fulbright Award to undertake research on the health status of street children in Kenya and also was an Emerging Infectious Disease Fellow at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Ms. Calhoun will complete her PhD at Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam in 2023 and holds a masters degree in Epidemiology from the University of Michigan.
As GVI’s measurement, evaluation, and learning partner, Mathematica conducted 20 key informant interviews from March to April 2023 to understand successes, challenges, and the impact made by VAN in its first year of implementation.
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