Dr. Eve McDermott is Senior Program Director for the Center for School, Family and Community (CSFC) at NWREL. Her work experience includes a decade of community college administration and two decades of work with community-based volunteer organizations. She is the project director for NWREL's role as a partner with the National Partnership for Quality Afterschool Learning (NPQAL) project funded by the U.S. Department Education. She is also in charge of the current five-year statewide evaluation of Oregon GEAR UP programs. Her areas of expertise are in qualitative research, community college administration, organization and program development, strategic planning, and volunteer management.

Changhua Wang, Ed.D., joined NWREL in 1992 and is currently an Evaluation and Research Unit Director. Since he came to NWREL, he has taken the lead on or participated in numerous evaluation projects relating to contextual learning and teaching, alternative education, technology integration, community and national services, small learning communities, mentoring programs, charter schools, GEAR UP and teacher preparation in higher education. He also conducted a number of cost and benefit studies in collaboration with economists in the Pacific Northwest. He is currently a member of the advisory committee of the National Study of Education in Undergraduate Science funded by the National Science Foundation.

Dr. Nicole Taylor has a Ph.D. in Anthropology and specializes in qualitative and mixed methods research design and evaluation. A Program Advisor of NWREL's Education, Career, and Community Program, Dr. Taylor is the co-evaluator for a statewide GEAR UP program, which aims to increase college enrollment among low-income youth throughout Montana, and lead evaluator for the STEP UP program, which is designed to reduce dropout rates among middle and high school youth in Portland, Oregon. Previous evaluation experience includes evaluating mentoring and substance abuse prevention programs funded by the U.S. Department of Education, the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, and the Department of Health and Human Services.

Rändi Douglas, Program Advisor at the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory since 1999, provides staff development in reading and writing instruction and literacy development for school and afterschool staff members and directors of volunteer programs across the nation. Her work is informed by two decades of experience teaching language arts and social studies to students in grades 4 through 12, as well as K-12 teachers and university undergraduate and graduate students. Her special passions are engaging students through active learning and supporting culturally and linguistically diverse learners. In her spare time she is a playwright and loves the wilderness.