Rebecca Sweetland Lester

Rebecca Lester’s work focuses on providing technical assistance and analytic support to federal and state clients in the areas of Medicaid managed care, long-term care, and individuals dually eligible for Medicare and Medicaid. She serves as deputy director of a technical assistance project for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) that aims to strengthen federal and state oversight of Medicaid managed care programs, health homes, and integrated delivery systems for vulnerable populations. She leads development of tools and issue briefs, conducts webinars, and provides ad hoc technical assistance across Medicaid-focused projects. She currently leads a task focused on measure alignment for a technical assistance and analytic support contract with CMS. Rebecca has conducted interviews and qualitative analyses for Medicaid and CHIP (Children’s Health Insurance Program) Payment and Access Commission projects in the areas of managed long-term services and supports and telehealth; she also authored issue briefs exploring state progress on rebalancing long-term care systems for the Money Follows the Person evaluation contract. Most recently, she was part of a team assessing the state of Connecticut’s response to coronavirus in nursing homes and assisted living facilities.

Before coming to Mathematica, Rebecca worked at Mission Analytics in San Francisco, California—where she coauthored the Balancing Incentive Payment Program Implementation Manual for states—and at Abt Associates in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Rebecca received her B.A. in political science from Smith College.