Project Staff

Management Team

Stephen Reder, Ph.D.,  Principal Investigator
University Professor and Chair of the Department of Applied Linguistics at Portland State University, Portland, OR. Reder is Principal Investigator for two of NCSALL’s research projects, the Longitudinal Study of Adult Learning and the National Labsite for Adult ESOL.

Clare Strawn, Ph.D.
Project Manager for the Longitudinal Study of Adult Learning, Waves 1-5. Research interest is in the intersection of community and adult learning.

Cynthia Lopez, MA TESOL
Project Manager for the Longitudinal Study of Adult Learning, Wave 6. Managed field and technical operations for data collection and panel retention in previous two waves. Conducts video interviews with LSAL pilot respondents.

Erik Simensen, MSW
Research Assistant managing field and technical operations for data collection from Wave one through four.  With the technical team he custom designed the data base system LSAL has used to track and schedule participants over time.

Data Analysis Team

Stephen Reder, Ph.D.: Big picture with specific interest in literacy measurement and development over time.

Clare Strawn, Ph.D. Patterns of participation in ABE and other learning strategies, influences of personal contexts on learning.

Jason Newsom, Ph.D. (Portland State University):  Longitudinal modeling.

Home Base Crew

Tracking supervisor
This position has supervised regular calling of respondents and follow up with contacts to locate them when they move.  Graduate Research Assistants who have held this position are Roz Roseman, Jean Stager, Natalie Masada White, Leslie Walker, Maya Trook, and John Cotton. John Cotton also took on the new role of Lead Interviewer for Wave 6, providing technical assistance and management of the Wave 6 team. 

Tracking staff
The following student employees have made the regular calls to and developed the person to person relationships with respondents that build identification with the study and improve retention: Jonena Welch, Cherise Frehner, Lisa Porter, Aaron Knudson, Sarah Baldwin, Michaelangelo Aust, Adam Egge, Jean Marie Stager, Lyndsay Culver, Kharim Poorman, Lucas Kerper, Samantha Kaan, Julie Staggs, Melisa Putney, Michael Howard, Rian Snider, Lindsay Freedman, Jason Yoshinaga, Jaqueline Marcotte, Chann Sou, Melyssa Sharp, and Katie Gentry.

The Remote Assessment Coordinator
The coordinator locates professionals near the new addresses where respondents moved when they left the Portland area and contracted with them to administer the TALS and pay the study participant.  Tracking supervisors Roz Roseman, Jean Stager Natalie Masada White, Leslie Walker, Samantha Kaan, Sarah Albers, and Maya Trook also took on these duties.

The Lead Detective
The detective uses various means developed by the project to locate participants that the tracking crew has been unable to reach. Amy R., Kristen Setzler, Cynthia Lopez, Kristy Ladd, and Willow Weir have lead the team efforts that have retained 90% of the sample over seven years.

Data Entry and Assessment Scoring
Done by Erin Saunders, Julie, Clara Ellis, Aaron Knudson, My Linh Nguyen, Samantha Kaan, Maya Trook, Lisa Monteblanco, and Julie Staggs.

Sample recruitment

At the beginning of the study a team of Graduate Research Assistants made approximately 130,000 telephone calls at the Survey Research Lab at Portland State University to identify and recruit study participants. This team included Emily Huang, Jeff Conn, Christof Walsdorf, Shanley Richards, Leslie Wiles, Kay Huxford , Tracy Gratto.

Interviewers

The following Graduate Research Assistants are responsible for collecting high quality data in a respectful manner.  The first three years of data collection were consecutive so many research assistants stayed with the project.  There was a one year lapse between Waves three and four, and Waves four and Five, so Waves four and five are mostly fresh crews.

Technical crew

Thom Cheadle with the Survey Research Lab at Portland State University programmed Wave one instruments into the Computer Assisted Telephone and Personal Interviewing software and facilitate the project use of SRL to identify and recruit the sample. 

Erik Simensen took the lead coordinating technical development of custom systems that have facilitated the sample retention and interview scheduling. In-house technical crew include Subu Swayam and  Prakesh Nallamis who developed the Access based respondent tracking system (acronym ERIK). Rizwan Kumte led a crew with Saad Dideiqui and Fahad Habib who converted the system for web based access. Vid Mihaescu and Glen Sasek have run the technical operation of the ERIK system and CAPI program in Waves 5 and 6.