PRACTICE AREAS
EDUCATION IN CONFLICT AND CRISIS
Helping the global education community adapt policies, guidance, and programming to better address the challenges of conflict, violence, disasters, instability, and epidemics.
PEACEBUILDING, STABILITY, TRANSITION
Working with stakeholders to prevent, manage and recover from crisis, build capabilities to reduce conflict and violent extremism, and achieve more stable and cohesive societies.
YOUTH
Taking a holistic and gender-sensitive approach to empowering youth and youth-led organizations working for change, with a specialization in youth, peace and security.
DEMOCRATIC GOVERNANCE
Fostering ways for the interface between government and civil society to be more inclusive, participatory, and accountable.
COMMUNITY RESILIENCE
Pursuing practical, cross-sectoral action to strengthen the ability of communities to prevent and reduce the impact of multiple threats and hazards.
CAPABILITIES
PROJECTS
ABOUT US
MANAGING DIRECTOR
James Rogan
For over 25 years Jim has worked at the grass roots and global levels to find solutions that help countries prevent, manage and recover from crisis—such as conflict, violence, political transition, disasters and complex emergencies. He has held senior management roles with consulting firms, NGOs and multilateral organizations, and has a track record of collaboratively delivering high quality results. He has worked in conflict- and crisis-affected countries in Latin America, the Balkans, and Africa and has supported initiatives in over 40 countries worldwide.
Jim brings unique leadership experience, having led a local government in conflict, a best-practice international NGO, and diverse teams in multiple organizational settings. He has extensive experience in managing crisis, developing policy and strategy, analyzing contextual risk, designing and managing programs, crafting guidance and tools, adapting organizational systems, training and facilitating, forging partnerships and resource mobilization.
Jim’s subject matter expertise includes peacebuilding, conflict sensitivity, violence prevention, community stabilization, democratic governance, youth development, humanitarian-development-peace nexus, and resilience. Much of his recent work has focused on the intersection of conflict, disasters and violence, and finding more holistic approaches to designing and implementing programs in complex contexts.
Some of Jim’s key roles have included:
- Team Leader for USAID Rapid Education and Risk Analysis (RERA) in El Salvador, Cox's Bazar (Bangladesh), Dominican Republic and, remotely, Colombia, Haiti and Iraq.
- International Expert and Senior Advisor for country-level peacebuilding strategies and programming, UN Secretary-General's Peacebuilding Fund
- Team Leader, reviews of UN implementation of the youth, peace and security agenda
- Senior Advisor, USAID Education in Crisis and Conflict Network and author of USAID's RERA Toolkit
- Chief, Peacebuilding, Recovery and Risk Reduction, UNICEF HQ
- General Manager, SIPU International (now FCG Sweden) executive management and restructuring of the Proni Institute of Social Education, a best-practice community youth education and peacebuilding NGO working on the former front lines across the Balkans, on behalf of Sida
- UN mayor and CEO, Lipjan Municipality, Kosovo
- US State Department secondee to the OSCE Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina, working with the Provisional Election Commission, directing the Mission’s Governance Program, guiding elections results implementation, and coordinating the drafting of the country’s first post-war election law
- Chief Information Officer and Spokesperson, leading IOM’s global outreach for Kosovo’s first external parliamentary vote
Jim is a member of the Leadership Circle for Foreign Policy for America and serves as a member of the Human Relations Advisory Council for his home town. He was a member of the start-up team for InVenture (now Tala, which was recently valued at nearly $1 billion) and was a start-up advisor to JustGive.com. He has published book chapters, journal articles, blogs and journalistic articles.
Jim holds a BSFS from Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, where he also pursued graduate work in national security studies, and an MA in International Political Economy from the University of Chicago.
SENIOR CONSULTANTS
Gwendolyn Heaner, PhD
Gwen is Founder and Managing Director of GK Consulting. She has over thirteen years of experience in social research in international development, with expertise in research design, fieldwork, analysis, and training, working with various companies, international NGOs, US-based non-profits and academic institutions on research methodology, education, social change, democracy and participation, religion and culture, gender, public health and social service delivery and infrastructure.
GK Consulting’s field research practice area has focused primarily on West Africa. Key projects recently completed include:
- Lead Global Consultant for a four-country quantitative and qualitative midline and baseline (endline planned for 2018) evaluation on youth financial education and skills development for Plan UK (Brazil, India, China, Rwanda);
- Project Manager and Quantitative Lead for a midline and baseline evaluation of Norwegian Church Aid’s Gender Based Violence Reduction Programme in North and South Kivu, DRC;
- Team Leader for a baseline and endline evaluation of a program to use SMS reporting mechanisms in reduce child sexual abuse in Liberia, and
- Gender Expert and Technical advisor for the Millennium Challenge Corporation’s investment in Liberia.
- Team Leader, designing and leading two longitudinal qualitative studies that examined the impact of the Syrian conflict on gender norms and community resilience for CARE UK/CARE Syria (among Syrians both inside Syria and refugees living in Turkey, Jordan, and Lebanon).
Gwen also consults independently for the World Bank, and is a Research Fellow at the University of Massachusetts Center for International Education (CIE), working as the Research Manager for USAID’s five-year project Education in Conflict and Crisis Network (USAID ECCN). For ECCN, Gwen led the development of the USAID Safe Learning Environments Toolkit, and the education in conflict and crisis evidence gap map.
She holds a BA from Smith College, a PhD from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, and was a graduate fellow at Harvard University.
Tammy Smith, PhD
Tammy Smith’s professional life has been divided between international development, humanitarian action and peacebuilding on the one hand and academic research on the other, always with a focus on conflict and post-conflict settings. She most recently headed the Design, Monitoring and Evaluation Unit for the UN Secretary-General’s Peacebuilding Fund, where she worked since 2013. From 2009 until 2013, Tammy served in a variety of posts with UNICEF, including in New York as Senior Peacebuilding Advisor and as Humanitarian Evaluation Specialist, and in Yemen, as Chief of Social Policy, Planning and M&E. Prior to joining the UN in 2009, she was Assistant Professor of Sociolog y at SUNY Stony Brook, with a research agenda focused on conflict and post-conflict societies, gender and institution building, and was a Research Fellow at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. Tammy’s research interests reflect work in her early career on economic and political transitions, mostly in the Balkans. From 1995-1999, Tammy worked in Croatia and Bosnia on human rights, gender and local governance with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
Tammy has a Ph.D. in Sociology from Columbia University and a Master of International Affairs from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs.
Beverly Hagerdon
Beverly is a senior elections expert with over 25 years of experience in all aspects of election administration. Her country experience includes electoral legislation, civic and voter education, voter registration, campaign finance, out-of-country operations, election dispute resolution, women’s political participation and leadership, electoral violence and hate speech, human rights education, and political inclusivity. She has held country director and chief of party roles with the International Foundation for Electoral Systems/USAID in the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Maldives, and Thailand. She has also held senior election management positions with IOM and the OSCE in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Afghanistan, Jordan and Pakistan. She is a regular speaker at international electoral assistance events globally, and is an accredited trainer in Building Resources in Democracy, Governance and Elections (BRIDGE).
She has an MA in International Affairs from George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs, and a BA in Government from Dartmouth College.
Marie Pace, PhD
Marie Pace integrates two decades of peacebuilding knowledge and experience with emerging thinking and approaches in leadership and complexity science. As a peacebuilding practitioner, she has worked in over 20 countries, including in-depth experience in Nigeria, South Sudan, Burundi and Yemen. Some of her key posts included serving as a Governance Officer for USAID, UN Peace and Development Advisor, and Program Officer for US Institute of Peace.
She has consulted for a variety of clients, including USAID, international NGOs, the UN, and the private sector. Her consulting roles have included: Conflict Specialist for USAID’s Rapid Education and Risk Analysis for Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh; Senior Evaluation Expert for USAID/Burundi’s Youth Support Assessment; Conflict Sensitivity Specialist for USAID/DRC’s Do No Harm assessment; International Conflict Specialist for USAID/Senegal; and Principal Investigator for USAID/Burundi’s Youth for Peacebuilding Activity Evaluation.
She has a Ph.D. in Conflict Studies from Syracuse University and an M.A. in International Studies from the University of Oregon. She is currently teaching a semester-long course on complexity and peacebuilding for Bard Globalization and International Affairs (BGIA) program.
Andrea Abel van Es, PhD
Andrea is a data driven consultant with expertise in peace, democracy and conflict research and specializing in quantitative and qualitative monitoring and evaluation. She has over 12 years of experience working with donors, multilateral organizations, international NGOs and think tanks on a range of topics including violent extremism (including large scale risk assessments in Africa, radicalization in Africa and the economic costs of terrorism in Africa), the peace benefits of renewable energy access, criminal justice sector reform and land governance. Her clients have included USAID, UNDP, UN Women, US State Department, Dexis, International Business and Technical Consultants International (IBTCI), the Institute for Economics and Peace, Energy Peace Partners, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the Electoral Integrity Project and the Kofi Annan Foundation.
Andrea has travelled extensively in sub-Saharan Africa, and has worked in Central African Republic, Liberia, Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, Mozambique, Uganda and Zambia. She holds a Bachelors and Masters in Aerospace and Mechatronic Engineering from the University of Sydney, and a PhD in Political Science from Stanford University.
Pall Davidsson
Pall is an expert in peacebulding and conflict resolution through security sector and justice reform, with over a decade of international experience in the field. Recently he led the effort of eleven UN agencies, including the peacekeeping mission, in developing a Joint United Nations Programme to move Darfur from protracted crisis to development through a comprehensive support to the rule of law. Pall has also managed major capacity building programs for justice and security institutions in Africa and Eastern Europe where he has lived and worked. Pall has provided consultancy services to UNDP, UN Global Focal Point for Police, Justice and Corrections and the World Bank. Pall is frequently called upon to manage workshops and deliver training in various fora on human rights, the rule of law and peacebuilding.
Pall is a regular lecturer at the Swedish Armed Forces International Centre and Fordham School of Law. He has a law degree from the University of Iceland, and an LLM from Columbia University, where he was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar.
Bassel Akar, PhD
Bassel Akar has 15 years of experience researching and working on education, conflict and fragility, corruption and violations of children’s rights, with a focus on Lebanon and the wider Arab region, including Jordan, Yemen, Iraq, Iraqi Kurdistan and Egypt. He has served as Associate Professor of Education at the Faculty of Humanities (2009-2023) and Director of the Center for Applied Research in Education (2014-2021) at Notre Dame University, Louaize, Lebanon.
Currently, he is Research Fellow at Centro de Estudos Africanos, Universidade do Porto. His international research team recently completed a six-month study assessing the usage of International Network for Education in Emergency (INEE) minimum standards over the past ten years across five main languages.
Since 2015, he has led on research projects that examine educational programs for Syrian refugee children in Lebanon and Jordan (formal, non-formal, early childhood). Most recently, he contributed to international studies by leading the Lebanon Case Study in Resilience in the Return to Learning during COVID-19 (USAID), The Impact of School Closures under COVID-19 on Child Protection and Education Inequalities in Humanitarian Settings (Proteknon & INEE) and Provision of Peace Education (Ulster University & UNESCO). He has also served as Team Leader for a Rapid Education and Risk Analysis in Lebanon.
Bassel has a PhD in Education and MA in Curriculum, Pedagogy and Assessment from the Institute of Education, University of London, and a BA in Psychology from the American University of Beirut. He has published academic studies on citizenship education, teaching and teacher agency in conflict-affected areas.
ASSOCIATE CONSULTANTS
Marvy Moujabber
Marvy is a public health specialist with experience in emergency preparedness and response, humanitarian action, research, and evaluation. She has worked with the Lebanese Red Cross in the emergency medical service (EMS), disaster risk reduction (DRR), training, and forensics. She previously worked as a Research Associate at the Center for Immigrant, Refugee, and Global Health at CUNY, as a Resettlement Intern at the International Rescue Committee in New York, and as a Research Consultant in Jordan with USAID Health Evaluation and Applied Research Development (HEARD) on the mid-term evaluation of USAID/Jordan's Health Service Delivery Project.
She has a Bachelor of Science in Biology from the Lebanese American University, and a Master of Public Health in Health Policy and Management from the CUNY School of Public Health. She is fluent in Arabic and French.
ADVISORS
Nina Suomalainen
Nina is an international crisis management and institutional development executive. Some of her recent leadership roles include serving as Executive Director at Justice Rapid Response in Geneva, Ambassador and Head of the OSCE Mission to Skopje, North Macedonia, Deputy Head of the OSCE Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina and Head of Mission for OSCE ODIHR election observation missions to Montenegro and Bulgaria. She has also held positions with UNDP, the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities, Finn Church Aid, the European Commission and European Parliament, and the Stability Pact for Southeastern Europe. She currently serves as Senior Manager for Eurasia at CMI - Martti Ahtisaari Peace Foundation, an independent Finnish organisation that works to prevent and resolve conflicts through dialogue and mediation and founded by Nobel Peace Laureate and former President of Finland Martti Ahtisaari.
In her native Finland, Nina is active in local and national politics. She was elected to the Helsinki City Council for the second time in 2021. She is also member of the Nordic Women Mediators network. She has a Master’s in political science from the Åbo Akademi University and a Diploma in International Trade Law from the University of Turku.
Barbara Brocker
Barbara has over 25 years of experience in federal contracts, grants, cooperative agreements and related compliance matters. She is currently President of Allegro Global Procurement Solutions, Inc. She served in a variety of positions with the US Government including Contracting and Agreement Officer, Acquisition and Assistance Ombudsman and Director of Procurement Policy for USAID. She also served as Associate Executive Director and Chief Financial Officer for an international health NGO. In 2008, Barbara launched her own company – Allegro Global Procurement Solutions. Allegro specializes in design and delivery of compliance training, policy and procedure writing and trouble-shooting of contract, grant and cooperative agreement compliance matters. Barbara is a Senior Trainer for the USAID A&A Management for CORs/AORs, Enhanced COR/AOR Skills Course and A&A Seminar for USAID Executives and an Allegro USAID Statement of Work Writing Workshop. She has designed and delivered over 25 unique classroom and on-line courses for USAID focused on international development.
George Irvine, PhD
George’s professional, teaching and research interests center on leveraging higher education expertise to catalyze social and economic development in developed and developing countries. He currently serves as Associate Vice Provost for Professional and Continuing Studies and Online Initiatives at University of Delaware, where he was also Director of Corporate Programs and Partnerships at the Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics, building mutually beneficial knowledge partnerships with regional companies and organizations in multiple industries, including JP Morgan Chase, W.L. Gore & Associates, Toyota and government agencies, among others. He serves as co-chair of the University of Delaware’s Council of Community Engagement and chair of the City of Newark’s Conservation Advisory Commission. In addition, George served in leadership positions in the University of Delaware’s Institute for Global Studies and its Division of Professional and Continuing Studies.
Prior to joining UD, George led international development projects in Eastern Europe and Asia for the German Marshall Fund of the United States, the Institute of International Education, USAID, and the Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise at the Kenan Flagler Business School of UNC Chapel Hill. Projects included the Accelerating Economic Recovery in Asia program (USAID), the US-Asia Environment Partnership Program (USAID and US Department of Commerce), the American Corporations for Thailand program (Kenan Institute Asia), and the Eastern European Environmental Grants program (German Marshall Fund). He has particular expertise in scoping, delivering and assessing international development projects that leverage private sector expertise to achieve public policy goals.
George holds a Ph.D. in Urban Affairs and Public Policy from the University of Delaware, an MA in International Relations from the University of Chicago, and a BA from Wesleyan University.
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