About MDRC
Hill joined MDRC in 2014 from Georgetown University, where she was a tenured associate professor of public policy. Hill is currently working on the Head Start Connects study and the Guilford Readiness of Children for School Study. Her previous projects include the Mother and Infant Home Visiting Program Evaluation, the Families Forward Demonstration, the Understanding Poverty: Childhood and Family Experiences Study, and a technical assistance project on the coordination between welfare-to-work programs under Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and workforce development services funded by the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act. Hill cocurates MDRC’s Implementation Research Incubator and helps lead MDRC’s Implementation Research Group, which supports innovative and rigorous implementation research methods across the organization’s policy areas and studies. Hill is the author of three books and a number of journal articles that address implementation, public management, performance measurement, and program evaluation, including Public Management: Thinking and Acting in Three Dimensions (CQ Press, 2015). She earned a BA in political science and Russian area studies from the University of Missouri-Columbia in 1989, an MA in public affairs from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1996, and a PhD in public policy from the University of Chicago in 2001.
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MDRC Publications
ToolkitA Guide for Researchers
June, 2023The guide provides recommendations about specifying implementation research questions, assessing whether and how a planned intervention is implemented, documenting the context in which an intervention is implemented, and measuring the difference between the intervention and what services the members of a control or comparison group receive.
ReportResults of a Qualitative Study Exploring the Perspectives of Children and Their Parents
July, 2022Some 10.5 million children in this country live in poverty, yet little is known about how they and their families view their daily experiences of poverty. In this report, children, adolescents, and their parents who participate in social safety net programs discuss their perceptions of poverty, wealth, and economic inequality.
Issue FocusJanuary, 2019The Incubator reviews the activities of another busy year — monthly posts, conference presentations, and dozens of MDRC publications informed by implementation research — and previews the topics of upcoming posts.
ReportResults from the Mother and Infant Home Visiting Program Evaluation
January, 2019Home visiting provides information, resources, and support to expectant low-income parents and low-income families with young children. This report provides the final results from a national evaluation of four major evidence-based models of home visiting.
ReportResults from the Mother and Infant Home Visiting Program Evaluation
October, 2018Adverse experiences in children’s earliest years can negatively affect development. Home visiting for expectant parents and families with young children can help, but implementation research is scant. MIHOPE, a national evaluation of a federal home visiting program, is examining 88 local programs across four evidence-based models to learn about their implementation and impacts.
Issue FocusFebruary, 2018Identifying and spreading effective policies and programs involves a cycle of implementation, adaptation, and evidence-building. Implementation research plays a central role in understanding and improving interventions at each stage of the cycle.
Working PaperJanuary, 2018This working paper (forthcoming in July 2018 as a chapter in The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science) updates the existing pipeline paradigm for evidence building with a cyclical paradigm that encompasses evidence building, implementation, and adaptation.
Issue FocusDecember, 2017The Incubator presents highlights of the year’s activities — the launch of monthly posts, conference workshops, numerous reports, and an array of new projects at MDRC involving implementation studies — and previews topics upcoming in 2018.
Issue FocusFebruary, 2017Researchers and funders often want to know not just whether a social program works, but how and why — the terrain of implementation research. This new series of monthly posts shares ideas from past program evaluations and insights from ongoing studies that can improve research approaches.
MethodologyOctober, 2008This MDRC working paper on research methodology explores two complementary approaches to developing empirical benchmarks for achievement effect sizes in educational interventions.
MethodologyJuly, 2007No universal guideline exists for judging the practical importance of a standardized effect size, a measure of the magnitude of an intervention’s effects. This working paper argues that effect sizes should be interpreted using empirical benchmarks — and presents three types in the context of education research.
MethodologyThe Effects of Program Management and Services, Economic Environment, and Client Characteristics
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Other Publications
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Projects
Michelle Maier, Carolyn Hill, Marissa Strassberger, Nina Castells, JoAnn Hsueh, Kara Helzner, Emily KowallOne of the hallmarks of Head Start is its whole-family approach to the services it provides. This approach is informed by evidence that low-income parents face challenges related to health, safety, and financial stability that can affect their well-being and economic mobility and their children’s school readiness. The Head Start Program Performance Standards ( HSPPS )...
Shira Kolnik Mattera, Desiree Principe Alderson, Tahsin Amin, Rebecca Davis, Carolyn Hill, Virginia Knox, Emily Kowall, Sydney Roach, Anne Warren, Samantha WulfsohnChildren’s life prospects are substantially shaped by their circumstances between birth and age 3, so the earliest years of life present promising opportunities to disrupt cycles of poverty. Children growing up in families with low incomes acutely experience the disadvantages of poverty, and they disproportionately remain at the bottom of the economic ladder as adults...
Carolyn Hill, M. Victoria Quiroz Becerra, Stephanie Rubino, Samantha Wulfsohn, Gilda Azurdia, Marissa StrassbergerThe official poverty rate for the U.S. population is high, at 13.5 percent, and the rate among children is higher still, at 19.7 percent. The body of research examining deep poverty, severe deprivation, and stress associated with poverty in adults has grown steadily with continued interest in recent years; however, qualitative research examining the experiences and...
More than one-third of all children under 18 — about 24 million children — live in single-parent families, the vast majority headed by single mothers. Although there have been improvements (such as automatic deductions from paychecks) in collecting and distributing child support from noncustodial parents (those who do not have physical custody of their children), more...
Virginia Knox, Charles Michalopoulos, JoAnn Hsueh, Desiree Principe Alderson, Dina A. R. Israel, Erika Lundquist, Electra Small, Carolyn Hill, Rebecca Behrmann, Ximena Portilla, Anne Warren, Samantha Xia, Kelly Saunders, Ilana Blum, Mallory Undestad, Emily Davies, Cullen MacDowell, Marissa Strassberger, Sharon Rowser, Livia Martinez, Helen Lee, Alexandra Giles, Tahsin AminHome visiting programs operate around the country to prevent child maltreatment, improve maternal and child health outcomes, and increase school readiness. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 authorized the creation of the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting ( MIECHV ) program, expanding federal funding of home visiting programs....