Senior Gender & Inclusive Development Specialist

Katie Cheney is EnCompass' Senior Gender & Inclusive Development Specialist, supporting the Advancing Women's Empowerment (AWE) Program and USAID Uganda Maternal Child Health and Nutrition Activity, among other projects. She brings more than ten years of experience specializing in gender and social inclusion, with a multifaceted foundation in project management, business development, and monitoring, evaluation, and learning. For the USAID Feed the Future Advancing Women’s Empowerment Program, Ms. Cheney served as Team Lead for activities to develop a toolkit to address GBV in agriculture, synthesize existing GBV resources for agriculture implementers, review evidence and develop capacity support resources on women’s decision-making in agriculture, and analyze women and youth inclusion in market systems development programs. With field experience in Botswana, Panama, the Philippines, and the Dominican Republic, Ms. Cheney has supported 10 USAID contracts and subcontracts throughout her career, across the sectors of gender, MEL, agriculture, education, health, and governance. She has extensive experience in quantitative and qualitative research methods and analyses, including leadership of or support to over a dozen research activities such as performance evaluations, literature reviews, gender analysis and assessment, and an evidence scan. Ms. Cheney has contributed to over 35 USAID prime and subcontract proposals, and wrote the technical approach for two winning proposals in the Philippines and Lesotho. Ms. Cheney holds an MS in International Development from Tulane University’s Payson Center for International Development and a BA from Penn State University, where she majored in Anthropology and minored in Women’s Studies and Religious Studies.