About emme | Team

Mr. Eric Bergthold is a Business and Program Development Specialist in RTI's Post Conflict Societies Unit. He has over 13 years experience in project development, implementation and management experience and has lived in and/or traveled to over 17 countries in Latin America, Africa, Asia and Europe. His experience includes supporting RTI's Local Governance Project in Iraq and conducting a baseline assessment and mid-term evaluation of RTI's Cambodia Basic Education Project.

Ms. Sandra Canfield has managed humanitarian aid and community-based development programs funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) in developing countries and post-conflict environments. She is experienced in designing M&E and market surveys for international projects, as well as quality assurance mechanisms for international programs. She has trained local staff and partners in the use of M&E methodologies and techniques.

Mr. Gordon Cressman is the Senior Director of the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) program for RTI's international development organization, heading the ICT and Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) teams. He has more than 26 years of experience. He is experienced in every phase of ICT systems design and implementation, including assessment, strategic planning, operational planning, systems integration, procurement, installation, training, and operation, which spans health, education, and governance. He has helped organizations in 13 developing countries to improve their ICT systems through sustainable strategies sensitive to local constraints.

Ms. Niamh Darcy has more than 19 years of experience in information and communications technologies, with a concentration in Knowledge Management, User Interface Design and more recently Monitoring and Evaluation. Ms. Darcy provides leadership and program management for international development projects leveraging technology to provide usable and transparent access to program information and results. Country experience includes Jordan, Zambia, Ukraine, Morocco, Nigeria and Ghana.

Dr. Catherine Elkins brings extensive M&E experience and technical expertise to the EMME team, including provision of direct M&E technical assistance at all levels, and curriculum design and training in formal M&E capacity-building workshops. In previous IT-related M&E work, she also brought to fruition an original idea to enhance M&E data use for decision-making in three USAID Missions through design and implementation of customized desktop database applications.

Ms. Rebecca Gadell's skills are grounded in her early experience as a communications professional and computer systems analyst/programmer for international computer firms. Applying these skills in public administration and international development contexts, she has developed a high level of expertise in the use of information and communication technology (ICT) to solve local government management problems while enhancing service quality and accountability to citizens. Ms. Gadell has worked on monitoring and evaluation in several projects, most recently in Ghana.

Mr. Eric Labow is an information strategy and management professional with over 13 years of industry experience managing and developing projects for small-to-mid sized companies. His experience with many software frameworks, methodologies, and architectures has been a valuable asset to the development of EMME. He holds a degree in Computer Science from Virginia Tech.

Mr. Mitchell Rakusin has broad international development experience in training, project management, monitoring and evaluation, and business development. He has worked extensively on USAID and State Department projects and proposals in diverse areas of civil society, local governance, health, education, and conflict mitigation. For a USAID/Pakistan Education Reform Support project he developed an office of technical support to provide communication, M&E and analytical services to project management. In Nigeria, Mr. Rakusin monitored a series of policy and planning workshops among local education officials and community stakeholders, evaluated the impact of these workshops, and developed a framework for transition to local ownership. Mr. Rakusin has lived and traveled throughout Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

Ms. Eileen Reynolds is an ICT specialist in RTI's International Development Group and helps projects use EMME effectively for monitoring and evaluation by assessing specific needs and requirements, training users, and creating training materials. Currently she provides monitoring and evaluation technical assistance for IDG democracy and governance projects in Morocco and Benin. Ms. Reynolds has managed and provided ICT technical assistance to projects in the fields of democracy and governance, international organization intranets, and electronic medical records system development in Benin, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Indonesia, Mali, Niger, and Zambia.

Dr. Sam Taddesse has over 30 years of professional experience in strategic planning, performance monitoring and evaluation, local government development, economic and social policy analysis, socioeconomic policy analysis, project design and implementation, project management, and feasibility studies. He has extensive regional experience in the Middle East, including Jordan, West Bank-Gaza, North Africa, Iraq, Kuwait, and Yemen; Africa, including Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Swaziland, Botswana and South Africa; Latin America and the Caribbean, including Jamaica, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Peru, Bolivia, and Columbia; and Asia, including Nepal, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan and Thailand.

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