Samantha Sugar

Research Associate

Samantha works intensely on the Youth Program Quality Intervention (YPQI) study, a funded research project that investigates organizational and instructional level quality in after-school programs.  Her roles for this project include data management and analysis as well as writing tasks.  Samantha also writes various research and evaluation reports related to the Youth Program Quality Assessment (Youth PQA) tool, including reports for the Detroit Neighborhood Arts Workshop (DNAW), the Iowa Collaboration for Youth Development (ICYD), the Palm Beach County Quality Improvement System, the Rhode Island Quality Improvement System, the New Mexico Youth Program Quality Assessment Pilot Project, the Arkansas Out-of-School Network Pilot Project, the Chicago Out-of-School Time Project Program Improvement Pilot, and for the Michigan Department of Education.  Samantha will also be working closely with the Forum for Youth Investment’s Ready by 21 Initiative to provide research and evaluation support..

Samantha officially joined the Center for Youth Program Quality full-time in May 2008. Prior to that, she worked as an intern for High/Scope Educational Research Foundation.

She holds a BA of Arts from Alma College where she majored in Sociology as well as Political Science and graduated from the University of Michigan with a Master of Social Work degree.  Samantha concentrated on social policy and evaluation in the area of children and youth during her time at the University of Michigan.