Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) Leadership
Commander Monique Fountain Hanna is a pediatrician and preventive medicine physician in the US. Public Health Services, Corp. (USPHS), working in the field of public health for the federal government. She currently serves as the Chief Medical Officer and Innovation Advisor for the US Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), Health Resources and Services...
Monique Fountain Hanna
Commander Monique Fountain Hanna is a pediatrician and preventive medicine physician in the US. Public Health Services, Corp. (USPHS), working in the field of public health for the federal government. She currently serves as the Chief Medical Officer and Innovation Advisor for the US Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), Maternal and Child Health Bureau, Division of Home Visiting and Early Childhood Systems. CDR Fountain-Hanna is the Division’s Quality Improvement and Innovation Advisor providing leadership and oversight in the area of continuous quality improvement to the 53 state, territory and tribal grantees implementing evidenced-based home visiting programs for women, infants and families. In this role, Dr. Fountain Hanna oversees the first national home visiting Collaborative Improvement and Innovation Network (CoIIN) as well as awardee implementation of elevated standards for quality improvement in the Federal Home Visiting Program. She also serves as the project lead for the Division’s innovation awards which use evidenced based theory to improve support systems in at-risk communities for families in need. Dr. Fountain Hanna has dedicated both her professional and personal life to serving those in diverse communities across the country who have traditionally had a limited voice to speak for themselves including children, impoverished and disenfranchised populations.
Education Development Center (EDC) Staff
Zhandra Levesque, public health expert and experienced manager, leads projects focused on improving population health. She brings expertise in continuous quality improvement (CQI), systems thinking, operational leadership, optimizing financial and human resources, and organizational development. Her content expertise includes maternal and child health, early childhood systems, and health equity. Levesque is the Project Director for...
Patricia Finnerty, with 15 years of experience working in the public health and healthcare fields, brings expertise in public health practice, the social determinants of health, and quality improvement concepts, specifically the Model for Improvement and IHI’s Breakthrough Series. Finnerty has designed, implemented, and provided quality improvement expertise for multiple national projects related to children’s...
Olivia Draper, an experienced coordinator, researcher, and instructional designer, offers expertise in health equity, child development, caregiver-child interactions, and qualitative research methods. Her comprehensive understanding of cross-functional collaboration, curriculum development, and research design yields high-quality outcomes for the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) Program. Draper is the project manager for the HV...
Sara Voelker, an experienced project manager and improvement advisor, brings expertise in maternal and child health, continuous quality improvement (CQI), training and technical assistance, research, and evaluation. Nationwide, she guides the use of evidence-based strategies to strengthen communities and improve outcomes for children and families. Voelker leads capacity-building services for 56 U.S. state and territory...
Sally Baggett brings more than 20 years of experience in the management of evidence-based, early childhood home visitation programs to inform her current role as a technical assistance specialist and topic lead. The integration of early childhood home visitation services into primary health care systems is a focal point for much of her efforts and...
Tom Hinds, a technical assistance specialist and quality improvement advisor, has extensive experience in program and project management, performance measurement, continuous quality improvement (CQI), and training and technical assistance. Hinds provides technical assistance to Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV)-funded state and territory home visiting programs, while also supporting internal CQI processes for...
Anna Hanel has experience in continuous quality improvement (CQI), project coordination, evaluation, and data analysis. Her interests lie in using CQI methods to improve maternal and child health outcomes through community-level initiatives that prioritize health equity. Hanel supports the HV CoIIN both as a project coordinator, and as the lead evaluator. She also works on...
Kate Hamby-Hopkins, a technology coordinator with the Education Development Center, Inc. is experienced with facilitating virtual events and finding solutions to technological challenges. In addition to her work with the HV CoIIN as an administrative coordinator, she has worked with several other groups focused on early childhood health, including the National Center on Health, Behavioral...
Xinxin Zhang, a research associate at EDC, has expertise in data analysis, educational research, and policy evaluation. Zhang specializes in cleaning large data sets, conducting descriptive analysis and predictive analytics, and presenting data to diverse audiences. She is passionate about supporting the use of data to inform policies with real impact. Zhang is the HV...
Crystal Jackson is a nonprofit professional with over twenty years’ experience in program development, research, and evaluation. With a lens toward racial equity, her work focuses on developing community-centered strategies that can alleviate social and economic disparities impacting marginalized groups and communities of color. She is also the founder and president of Good Human, a...
Mary Mackrain, previously the Director of Maternal and Child Health at EDC, is a national leader in infant and early childhood mental health systems and continuous quality improvement (CQI) methods. She served as an expert adviser to federal, state, community, and program leaders on child and family mental health, resilience, early care and education quality,...
Zhandra Levesque, MPH
Zhandra Levesque, public health expert and experienced manager, leads projects focused on improving population health. She brings expertise in continuous quality improvement (CQI), systems thinking, operational leadership, optimizing financial and human resources, and organizational development. Her content expertise includes maternal and child health, early childhood systems, and health equity.
Levesque is the Project Director for the HV CoIIN. Prior to EDC, Levesque led maternal and child health initiatives at the National Institute for Children’s Health Quality, including the Infant Mortality and Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems CoIINs.
Levesque holds an MPH in Health Policy and Management from the Boston University School of Public Health and a BA in Political Science from Boston University. She is a native of Caracas, Venezuela, and is fluent in Spanish and English.
Patricia Finnerty, MSc
Patricia Finnerty, with 15 years of experience working in the public health and healthcare fields, brings expertise in public health practice, the social determinants of health, and quality improvement concepts, specifically the Model for Improvement and IHI’s Breakthrough Series. Finnerty has designed, implemented, and provided quality improvement expertise for multiple national projects related to children’s health, including home visiting, infant mortality, and early childhood comprehensive systems.
Finnerty currently serves as Director of Improvement for the HV CoIIN. Before joining EDC, she served as Associate Director of Improvement at the National Institute for Children’s Health Quality (NICHQ) where she provided leadership in the design and implementation of national Breakthrough Series Learning Collaboratives and Collaborative Improvement and Innovation Networks (CoIIN).
Finnerty received her MSc, with a concentration in maternal and child health, from the Harvard School of Public Health, where she also served as a teaching fellow. Finnerty has completed an intensive Improvement Advisor course at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement.
Olivia Draper, EdM
Olivia Draper, an experienced coordinator, researcher, and instructional designer, offers expertise in health equity, child development, caregiver-child interactions, and qualitative research methods. Her comprehensive understanding of cross-functional collaboration, curriculum development, and research design yields high-quality outcomes for the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) Program.
Draper is the project manager for the HV CoIIN. She is also the universal technical assistance (TA) lead for the MIECHV Innovation TA Center. Prior to EDC, Draper worked at Harvard University as a research associate for the Democratic Knowledge Project and the XMedia Lab.
Draper holds an Ed.M. from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, as well as certificates in public health and statistical analysis from Imperial College London. Draper is also a trained birth doula and working to complete her certification through DONA International.
Sara Voelker, MPP, MA
Sara Voelker, an experienced project manager and improvement advisor, brings expertise in maternal and child health, continuous quality improvement (CQI), training and technical assistance, research, and evaluation. Nationwide, she guides the use of evidence-based strategies to strengthen communities and improve outcomes for children and families.
Voelker leads capacity-building services for 56 U.S. state and territory awardees as the assistant director of the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) Program’s Technical Assistance Resource Center. As an improvement advisor for the HV CoIIN, Voelker guides teams in achieving breakthrough improvements through collaborative learning and scaling of well-tested interventions.
Voelker holds an MPP and an MA in social work, policy, and practice from the University of Chicago. She received her PMD Pro Certification as a project manager from APMG International.
Sally Baggett
Sally Baggett brings more than 20 years of experience in the management of evidence-based, early childhood home visitation programs to inform her current role as a technical assistance specialist and topic lead. The integration of early childhood home visitation services into primary health care systems is a focal point for much of her efforts and the topic of her published works.
Baggett, a former home visiting supervisor herself, has worked on a number of CoIINs in a variety of different roles since the inception of HV CoIIN in 2013.
Baggett is a charter member of the Home Visiting Applied Research Collaborative Council. She received her BA from Furman University.
Thomas Hinds, MIPA
Tom Hinds, a technical assistance specialist and quality improvement advisor, has extensive experience in program and project management, performance measurement, continuous quality improvement (CQI), and training and technical assistance.
Hinds provides technical assistance to Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV)-funded state and territory home visiting programs, while also supporting internal CQI processes for the MIECHV Technical Assistance Resource Center. As a topic lead for the HV CoIIN, Hinds facilitates collaborative learning to assist teams with scaling well-tested interventions. Prior to joining EDC, Hinds led CQI and performance reporting for Wisconsin’s MIECHV program.
Hinds holds a Master of International Public Affairs, with specializations in social policy, policy analysis, and program evaluation, from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is a native English speaker with full professional proficiency in Spanish and limited working proficiency in Portuguese and Lunda (spoken in Zambia, Angola, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo).
Anna Hanel, MPH
Anna Hanel has experience in continuous quality improvement (CQI), project coordination, evaluation, and data analysis. Her interests lie in using CQI methods to improve maternal and child health outcomes through community-level initiatives that prioritize health equity.
Hanel supports the HV CoIIN both as a project coordinator, and as the lead evaluator. She also works on the Massachusetts Department of Public Health’s State Maternal Health Innovation & Data Capacity Program, as the project coordinator. Previously, she served as improvement advisor for the National Center on Health, Behavioral Health, and Safety.
Hanel holds an MPH from Boston University and is a trained birth doula.
Kate Hamby-Hopkins
Kate Hamby-Hopkins, a technology coordinator with the Education Development Center, Inc. is experienced with facilitating virtual events and finding solutions to technological challenges. In addition to her work with the HV CoIIN as an administrative coordinator, she has worked with several other groups focused on early childhood health, including the National Center on Health, Behavioral Health and Safety (NCHBHS), and the Home Visiting Improvement Action Center (HV-ImpACT).
Before beginning her work with the Education Development Center, Inc. she attended Tulane University where she volunteered in New Orleans’ classrooms while earning a bachelor’s degree in sociology.
Xinxin Zhang, MPP
Xinxin Zhang, a research associate at EDC, has expertise in data analysis, educational research, and policy evaluation. Zhang specializes in cleaning large data sets, conducting descriptive analysis and predictive analytics, and presenting data to diverse audiences. She is passionate about supporting the use of data to inform policies with real impact.
Zhang is the HV CoIIN’s data manager. She is also a researcher for a study on career academies and a project on developing children’s computational literacy. Before joining EDC, Zhang collected and analyzed performance data for Boston Public Schools. Earlier in her career, she was a financial analyst.
Zhang holds an MA in Public Policy from the University of Chicago, an MA in Economics from Fudan University, and a BA in Economics from Tsinghua University. She is fluent in English and Chinese.
Crystal Jackson, PsyD
Crystal Jackson is a nonprofit professional with over twenty years’ experience in program development, research, and evaluation. With a lens toward racial equity, her work focuses on developing community-centered strategies that can alleviate social and economic disparities impacting marginalized groups and communities of color. She is also the founder and president of Good Human, a consultancy firm focused on strengthening the capacity of nonprofit organizations to develop and implement initiatives, and to use research to inform strategic imperatives.
A native of Kentucky, Crystal lives in her adopted hometown of Chicago, Illinois. She holds a doctorate in sociology from Loyola University Chicago. In her spare time, she enjoys creative writing, hiking, and triathlon training.
Mary Mackrain, PhD
Mary Mackrain, previously the Director of Maternal and Child Health at EDC, is a national leader in infant and early childhood mental health systems and continuous quality improvement (CQI) methods. She served as an expert adviser to federal, state, community, and program leaders on child and family mental health, resilience, early care and education quality, relational health, and systems change.
A well-known author, Mackrain has published works on breastfeeding, trauma-informed care, home visitor/family partnerships, resilience, and creating CQI plans. Nationwide, she presents on infant and early childhood mental health consultation and CQI efforts within maternal and child health.
Mackrain holds a PhD in Early Childhood, Human Development and Child Studies from Oakland University; an MEd in Educational Psychology from Wayne State University; and a Level IV Endorsement in Infant Mental Health Policy through Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health.
Partners
Established in 2020, Health Equity Resources and Strategies (H.E.R.S) addresses the disparate rates in health outcomes for Black and Brown communities. H.E.R.S. believes that organizations need a strategic approach that specifically addresses racist practices in program design and workforce development, and inclusive of the communities most adversely impacted by adverse health outcomes. With expertise in integrating equity approaches to workforce development, program management, and research, H.E.R.S. provides wraparound support, and processes that track and move sustainability policies forward, while aligning program deliverables with changing community needs.
Brigham and Women’s Hospital is a major teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School and a leader in improving health care quality and developing industry best practices. Its Division of Global Health Equity is committed to training, research, and service in health care to reduce health disparities and improve treatment outcomes, both domestically and abroad. The Division’s foci include child health and development; its staff brings expertise in CQI, as well as home visiting and early childhood systems.
Institute for Healthcare Improvement is focused on motivating and building the will for change and identifying, testing, and delivering new, high-impact models that result in measurable improvement in outcomes and ensuring the broadest possible adoption of best practices and effective innovations. At the core of its work is the Model for Improvement, which IHI has successfully taught to organizations around the world to improve system processes and outcomes. Through its renowned 100,000 Lives Campaign and 5 Million Lives Campaign, IHI has spread best practice changes to thousands of US hospitals and created a vibrant worldwide improvement community that reinvented multidimensional systems of care and transformed entire systems. IHI has also worked with regions, communities, and coalitions on programs that reduce homelessness, build capacity for early childhood development and learning and promote health improvement in schools.
The Urban Institute is a nonprofit research organization and trusted source for changemakers who seek to strengthen decision-making, create inclusive economic growth, and improve the well-being of families and communities. that provides data and evidence to help advance upward mobility and equity. For more than 50 years, Urban has helped advance upward mobility and equity by providing data and evidence that inspires solutions.
Ideas to Impact is a professional services consulting firm that works collaboratively with a broad range of organizations. With expertise in research and evaluation, training and technical assistance, convening and facilitation, Ideas to Impact brings substantive knowledge in the fields of children, youth and families; qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis; and processes that result in meaningful and accessible reporting.
Monica Gaines Consulting
Monica Gaines, founder, brings years of professional and lived experience to the field of home visiting. With expertise in family leadership principles, Gaines supports MIECHV-funded home visiting programs to build infrastructure for family leaders and center the lived experience of caregivers in their CQI work. Gaines is also a home visiting supervisor in Wayne County, Michigan.
Steering Committee
Committee members meet quarterly to advise the management team on factors within the social environment of MIECHV programs that will foster scale up of best practices; advise on the course of the project; and steer the HV CoIIN 2.0 vision, goals, workplan, theory, measurement system, and improvement activities.
Model Developers
Jennifer Henk (Home Instruction for Parents of Preschool Youngsters)
Kathleen Strader (Healthy Families America)
Sandra Horowitz (Parents as Teachers)
Sarah Walzer (Parent-Child Home Program)
MIECHV Awardee Leadership
Allison Parish (Florida MIECHV Initiative)
Daniela Hellman (NJ Department of Children & Families)
Icelynn Baldwin (Children’s Trust of South Carolina)
Julia Heany (Michigan Department of Health and Human Services)
Lakota Kruse (NJ Department of Children & Families)
Sarah Bowman (Rhode Island Department of Health)
Thomas Hinds (Wisconsin Department of Children and Families)
Tiffany Kostelac (Michigan Department of Health and Human Services)
Local Implementing Agencies
Jeff Langlieb (Healthy Families – Central Racine County Health Department, WI)
Mary Beth Tribble (Lac Courte Oreilles Mino Majesewin Home Visitation Program, WI)
Jenny Bisonette (Lac Courte Oreilles Mino Majesewin Home Visitation Program, WI)
National Technical Assistance Partners
Susan Zaid (Design Options for Home Visiting Evaluation)
Faculty & Content Experts
Jon Korfmacher (Erikson Institute)
Nancy Topping-Tailby (Education Development Center)
Home Visiting Program Specialists
Alicia Bowker (NJ Department of Children & Families)
CQI State Leads
Daniela Guarda (NJ Department of Children & Families)
Home Visiting Program Lead
Jill Brown (NJ Department of Children & Families)
Scale Leadership Team
This team aided in the development of the initial scale up-plan. Throughout the life of the project, they will refine the project’s vision, goals, and workplan, regularly reviewing and tracking progress towards project scale up goals, initiating indicated course corrections, sharing project results, and promoting the spread of proven practices across the entire home visiting community.
Mary Mackrain (HV CoIIN Project Director, Education Development Center)
Dr. MaryCatherine Arbour (Lead Improvement Advisor, Brigham and Women’s Hospital)
Dr. Deborah Daro (Executive Leader and Supporter, University of Chicago, Chapin Hall)
Dr. Paul Dworkin (Developmental Promotion, Early Detection, and Linkage to Services Advisor, Connecticut Children’s Medical Center and University of Connecticut School of Medicine)
Dr. Darius Tandon (Maternal Depression Advisor, Northwestern University)
