Gilda
Azurdia
Senior Associate, Economic Mobility, Housing, and Communities

Azurdia’s research has focused on evaluations testing housing, education, and employment-related interventions for low-income workers, welfare recipients, residents of subsidized housing, and other disadvantaged groups. Azurdia is currently the data manager for the Rent Reform Demonstration, the Creating Moves to Opportunity study, the Paycheck Plus project, the City University of New York’s (CUNY’s) Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP), and the Understanding Poverty project. Azurdia also serves as the project manager for the Generation Work project. As lead data manager, Azurdia has managed data acquisition and processing for various kinds of data including baseline characteristics, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families payment records, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefit records, housing benefit records, earnings and employment data, Medicaid data, State Children’s Health Insurance Program data, school records, National Student Clearinghouse data, program-participation data, mortality data, survey results, arrest and incarceration records, and more. Azurdia has also led and coauthored several reports where she was responsible for presenting economic impact findings and other technical results. She has almost two decades of experience working in most phases of MDRC’s research, including program start-up, implementation analysis, survey design, and impact analysis. She holds a master’s degree in criminal justice.