Jane Bertrand, director of the Center for Communication
Programs, and Thomas Quinn, director of the Center for
Global Health, have announced that Johns Hopkins has
won a five-year award from the U.S. Agency for
International Development for its Project SEARCH —
Supporting Evaluation and Research to Combat HIV/AIDS.
The proposal submitted by CCP and the Center for
Global Health brings together the expertise of more than 75
staff from the schools of
Public Health,
Medicine and
Nursing and
JHPIEGO and allows the team to be one of five awardees
to bid on future task orders. USAID has projected the task
orders could potentially reach $200 million.
Bertrand will serve as project director on the award,
and CCP will manage it in collaboration with the Center for
Global Health. The team's external partners are Marco
International, Abt Associates and Social Sectors
Development Strategies.
"This award shows the power of collaboration at
Hopkins," Bertrand said. "By drawing from our many
strengths and deep experience in global HIV/AIDS work, we
offered a capability that is extraordinary."
Quinn said, "Project SEARCH provides a unique and
important opportunity for Hopkins and its partners to
contribute to programs in HIV prevention and care. The
topics of potential evaluative studies are crucial in
determining appropriate models of care and prevention so
program funds are used to best advantage.
"These topics seem to be matched extraordinarily well
with our capabilities," he said. "I am also particularly
pleased that there is an interest in translating structured
evaluations and research to policy, as this coincides with
the goals of the center."
The pre-approval mechanism for future task orders
provides a more efficient response to the short- and
long-term needs of USAID missions overseas by establishing
a competitive bidding process open only to the Project
SEARCH awardees.
The goal of Project SEARCH is to carry out research
and evaluation to improve coverage, quality and
effectiveness of HIV/AIDS prevention, care and treatment
programs worldwide. In addition, it will serve to
strengthen local capacity in HIV/AIDS research and public
health assessments through training and in-country
collaborations.
Project SEARCH may be used for developing and
evaluating models of HIV/AIDS prevention, care and
treatment programs; conducting public health evaluations to
investigate effectiveness of interventions and translating
results into public health guidelines; identifying and
disseminating best practices to improve program efficiency
and effectiveness; developing national and international
standards and indicators for the purpose of program
monitoring and evaluation; conducting analyses of clinical,
community-level and population-based epidemiologic,
demographic and surveillance data; testing program
implementation models including research on practical
applications of new technologies and intervention models in
resource-poor settings; carrying out feasibility studies,
community preparedness studies and policy analyses; and
developing local capacity in applied research and ethical
procedures by increasing technical skills of developing
country investigators and providing technical assistance to
in-country institutions.
The other groups receiving this award are Boston
University, Family Health International, the Futures Group
(with the University of Washington) and the Population
Council.
Questions about this award may be directed to Cathy
Church-Balin at CCP,
cchurch@jhuccp.org.