Ashweeta Patnaik joined the Ray Marshall Center for the Study of Human Resources (RMC) as a Social Science Research Associate in May 2013. Ms. Patnaik has eight years of experience conducting program evaluations, needs assessments, epidemiological research, health surveillance, and survey research. She specializes in quantitative research methods, statistical programming and administrative data linkage. She has a Masters degree in Public Health from The University of Texas Health Science Center, and she is a certified SAS Base Programmer.
Currently at the Ray Marshall Center, Ms. Patnaik is conducting impact evaluations for two federally-funded multi-year workforce development projects in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi: (1) Growing Regional Opportunity for the Workforce: Expanding the Border for Lower Skilled Adults (GROW), funded by a WIF grant from the U.S. Department of Labor, and (2) Gulf Coast IT Pathways Consortium, funded by a TAACCCT grant from the U.S. Department of Labor. She is also providing programming and analytical support for evaluations of human service programs such as the Texas Integrated Child Support System, funded by the Texas Office of the Attorney General, Office of Child Support Enforcement, and the Urban Fathers Building Assets Initiative, funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Children and Families, Office of Child Support Enforcement.
Prior to joining the Ray Marshall Center, Ms. Patnaik was a research associate at the Public Policy Research Institute at Texas A&M University. As a graduate student at The University of Texas Health Science Center, she worked at the Southwest Center for Occupational Health, where she was involved in the implementation and internal evaluation of the Sacred Vocation Program, a workplace change program. She also interned with the Environmental Epidemiology & Injury Surveillance Group at the Texas Department of State Health Services where she led a study on the epidemiology of drowning injuries in Texas.
Ms. Patnaik has substantive expertise and training in quantitative research methodologies, including hypothesis testing, advanced regression analysis, propensity score matching, difference-in-differences estimation, structural equation modeling and decision tree analysis. She has designed and conducted multi-modal surveys in a variety of settings, including schools, colleges and universities. She has compiled and analyzed large demographic and sociological data sets, including data from the U.S. Census and data from state agencies (Texas Department of State Health Services, Texas Department of Education, Texas Higher Education Board, Texas Workforce Commission, and the Texas Office of the Attorney General). She is adept at mastering and applying new software and analytical methods.
Ms. Patnaik also has experience with qualitative research methods, including facilitating and conducting focus groups, community listening sessions, and key informant interviews. She has also conducted text analysis of qualitative data using SPSS Text Miner and Atlas.TI. In addition to preparing presentations, white papers, research briefs and evaluation reports for state and federal agencies, Ms. Patnaik has also authored articles for academic journals and presented at national conferences.
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