Dr. Wanda Casillas is a researcher and monitoring, evaluation, assessment, and learning (MEAL) consultant specializing in data-based strategy and decision-making for healthcare and education programs, processes, and organizations. She has also worked as a trainer, program manager, facilitator, and met other consultant roles as needed.
She has experience in:
- academia as a professor,
- in corporate consultancy,
- in boutique consultancy,
- has worked extensively with philanthropy and federal government partners, and
- has successfully managed her own consultancy intermittently.
Wanda has also held leadership positions in the American Evaluation Association (AEA), served as a journal editor for the preeminent journals in her field, and served on the board of the AEA.
Across her research and evaluation, Wanda draws on rigorous mixed methods research designs that include data collection strategies such as large scale quantitative surveys, administrative and clinical data, focus groups, individual interviews, and secondary data. Dr. Casillas and her teams have created intricate data dashboards, journey maps, infographics, and other creative data analytics tools to support stakeholder understanding of research and MEAL findings.
Wanda earned a Ph.D. from the Department of Human Development at Cornell University (Developmental Psychology) and completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship with the University of Michigan in educational program evaluation and institutional research.
Additionally, Dr. Casillas has a personal research interest in appropriate educational strategies for children with autism. For more on that work, please visit her site at www.parentingthroughasd.net.