As the summer comes to a close, we would like to extend our deepest thanks to the four outstanding interns that joined Social Impact’s team this summer. Camila, Damai, Hannah and Leeann adapted to the virtual environment necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic and jumped enthusiastically into working remotely on four of Social Impact’s long-term field office projects. Each intern, from Georgetown’s Global Human Development Graduate Program, provided meaningful contributions to their respective project, from a knowledge management repository, to establishing best practices for Implementing Partners in Vietnam, to building staff capacity on data visualizations. We’d like to highlight and thank each individual intern for their accomplishments at SI!
Camila Linneman, Liberia Strategic Analysis (LSA) Intern
Camila provided support to LSA’s knowledge management strategy; taking a bird eyes view of the various activities, she worked with key team members to develop the strategy and an innovative repository to ensure institutional knowledge and sustainability. Camila also contributed a fresh academic perspective to the LSA activity by conceptualizing and drafting a white paper on the use of CLA in post-conflict contexts, which demonstrates the linkages between LSA’s lessons learned and the broader international development literature. Camila’s contributions were key during a critical time in LSA’s implementation – in its fifth and final year, thank you Camila. Learn more about Camila’s experience at SI here.
Damai Vergara-Hegi, Indonesia MEL Intern
During his time with the Indonesia MEL activity, Damai worked on compiling a literature review on, “USAID’s Journey to Self-Reliance (J2SR) and the dynamics of scaling up innovations.” This research introduced J2SR and its processes, compared it with different models of innovation scaling that exist in international development, and provided ideas for developing indicators to scale innovations and make them sustainable. Damai’s literature review proved very useful for the Indonesia MEL team as they continue to support the USAID Indonesia mission in implementing the new Country Development Cooperation Strategy with a J2SR Lens.
Hannah Lapalombara, Vietnam Learns Intern
Hannah’s excellent support to the Vietnam Learns program during her summer internship greatly contributed to the knowledge base of materials available for Activity Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Plan (AMELP) development and review, which will help ensure that all Implementing Partners (IPs) working with USAID/Vietnam are operating under the same MEL principles. In order to guide new IPs and help establish MEL best practices from the beginning, Hannah was instrumental in drafting and finalizing AMELP templates, how-to guidance notes, and scoring rubrics and conducting AMELP reviews to pilot the developed tools. Her support was also crucial to the newly on-boarded monitoring staff in Hanoi with their immense task of dozens of upcoming DQAs in a very short window before the end of FY2020. Learn more about Hannah’s experience at SI here.
Leeann Whittson, Ethiopia (EPMES) Intern
Leeann contributed enormously to the EPMES team’s work during her three-month internship. Her work included data analysis, visualization, and drafting lessons learned around EPMES’ virtual training work, as well as preparing and delivering an internal staff training in data visualization. Leeann also helped to start up a major task reviewing Activity LME Plans for USAID/Ethiopia implementing mechanisms. The EPMES team is grateful for all Leeann’s contributions. Learn more about Leeann’s experience at SI here.
A big thank you to Camila, Damai, Hannah and Leeann, we wish you all the best of luck with your future endeavors! Stay tuned for a deeper look into the work of each intern during their time at SI on our News & Impact page.
Photo Credit: Matthew Henry, Burst
