Eric Goplerud, PhD
Director
goplerud@gwu.edu

Dr. Goplerud is a Research Professor in the Department of Health Policy at The George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. His policy and research interests focus on improving access to alcohol screening and treatment, integration of primary health and behavioral healthcare services, performance measurement in managed behavioral health, and public/private quality improvement initiatives in behavioral healthcare.

Previously, Goplerud was Associate Administrator for Quality and Finance at the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration (SAMHSA). He was instrumental in negotiating with the Office of Personnel Management for full parity for alcohol, drug, and mental health treatment in the Federal Employees Health Benefit Program. He also managed SAMHSA's public and private sector managed behavioral healthcare activities. While director of the Division of Planning and Policy Implementation at SAMHSA, he served on the Mental Health Workgroup of the White House National Health Care Reform Task Force, where he had lead responsibility for substance abuse prevention. He has also held senior positions at the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention and the Division of Demand Reduction, Office of National Drug Control Policy, Executive Office of the President.

Delia Olufokunbi, PhD
Chief Operating Officer
olufokun@gwu.edu

Dr. Olufokunbi is a Senior Research Scientist in the Department of Health Policy at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. She is Chief Operating Officer of Ensuring Solutions to Alcohol Problems. Dr. Olufokunbi received her doctorate in Clinical and Health Psychology and has more than six years of project management and research experience. Dr. Olufokunbi has conducted research and evaluation in the areas of behavioral health policy, substance abuse, child and adolescent development, welfare reform, and domestic violence. Prior to joining Ensuring Solutions, Dr. Olufokunbi was a Senior Associate at Caliber Associates.

David R. Anderson, MGA
Communications Director
danderso@gwu.edu

David Anderson is a Senior Research Scientist in the Department of Health Policy at The George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. David has a wide range of experience in public health, crime prevention, policing, and public finance. Prior to joining Ensuring Solutions, David was the vice president of communications and marketing for Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America (CADCA). He has also served as the deputy director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Fighting Back National Program Office at Boston University and as the public safety advisor to Mayor Richard M. Daley in Chicago. David earned a BA in international studies from Allegheny College and received a master's in government administration from the University of Pennsylvania, Fels Institute of Government.

Ann Doucette, PhD
Research Director
doucette@gwu.edu

Dr. Doucette is a Senior Research Scientist in the Department of Health Policy at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. Ann has broad experience in the management, analysis, and evaluation of intervention programs, including the development of quality monitoring, accountability and outcome system design in behavioral healthcare. Her expertise includes in research methodology, data collection, psychometric and measurement techniques, evaluation research, and applied statistical analysis, including both quantitative and qualitative approaches.

Her research and evaluation expertise includes healthcare, mental health and substance abuse treatment effectiveness and service system outcomes, educational reform, domestic and youth violence, and community-based initiatives. Much of this work relies on performance measurement. To that end, she developed several assessment measures using Item Response Theory to generate more precise measurement that results in briefer, less burdensome instrumentation that lends itself to clinical feed-back systems, computer-adaptive applications and real-time data usage. Ann serves on the Executive Committee and co-chairs the Methods Workgroup of the Forum on Performance Measures for Behavioral Healthcare and Related Service Systems, is a member of the NCQA (HEDIS) Adolescent Substance Abuse and ADHD Technical Advisory Panel, the JCAHO Technical Advisory Panel for Hospital-Based, Inpatient Psychiatric Services Performance Measurement, and a faculty member of the Evaluators' Institute®. She received her doctoral training at Columbia University.

Lisa B. Feng
Communications Assistant
lisa.feng@gwumc.edu

Lisa is a Communications Assistant for Ensuring Solutions in the Department of Health Policy at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. She has a BS in Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior from University of California at Davis. Lisa is also a health policy MPH student at GWU SPHHS.

Amy Hereford, MSW, MPH
Staff Writer/Senior Research Associate
hereford@gwu.edu

Amy is a Staff Writer/Senior Research Associate for Ensuring Solutions in the Department of Health Policy at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. She is primarily responsible for writing research briefs and news releases, as well as researching health and wellness information related to alcohol dependency. Her previous experience includes health writing, research, and program coordination for national nonprofits and physician associations in the areas of women's health, physician reimbursement and pediatric care. Prior to becoming a researcher/writer, Amy practiced social work in New Orleans, LA and the Washington, DC metropolitan area. She received a BA in psychology, an MSW and an MPH from Tulane University in New Orleans, LA.

Laura Jacobus-Kantor, PhD
Senior Research Associate
lljk@gwu.edu

Dr. Jacobus-Kantor is a Senior Research Associate in the Department of Health Policy at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. Dr. Jacobus-Kantor recently received her doctorate in Community Psychology and has experience in the areas of program evaluation, juvenile justice, domestic violence, and substance abuse issues.

Tracy McPherson, PhD
Senior Research Scientist
tracym@gwu.edu

Dr. McPherson is a Research Scientist at Ensuring Solutions in the Department of Health Policy at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. She has served as Project Director and Research Scientist on workplace health promotion projects for over ten years, primarily in the area of substance abuse prevention program development, research, and evaluation. Her research interests include improving workers' access to substance abuse and mental health screening and brief intervention practices by employers and behavioral health providers. She has also co-authored a number of publications and presentations related to the field test evaluation of worksite health promotion programs. Dr. McPherson holds a PhD in Applied Social Pscyhology from the George Washington University.

Justin Roby, PhD
Webmaster
jroby@gwu.edu

Justin Roby is the Webmaster for the Department of Health Policy at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services. He maintains and writes the code for the Alcohol Cost Calculator. He completed his PhD in American Literature at The George Washington University, and received his BA in English from the University of California at Riverside.