Phone: 801.966.5644
6068 S. Jordan Canal Rd., Salt Lake City, UT 84118
About Us
| The Institute |
| The Institute for Research and Evaluation (IRE) is a nonprofit research organization that has gained national recognition for its work evaluating sex education programs, particularly abstinence education interventions. IRE has conducted program evaluations for Title V, CBAE, and Title XX projects in 30 states and three foreign countries, collected data from more than 500,000 teens, and produced over one hundred studies of abstinence education during its 20-year history. IRE staff members have published several journal articles and frequently speak at professional conferences and workshops. They have also been invited to provide expert testimony to state legislative bodies, the U.S. Senate, the U.S. House of Representatives (most recently in April, 2008), and the White House (June, 2009). |
| Stan E. Weed, PhD—Founder, Senior Fellow, and Chairman of the Board |
| Dr. Weed completed his PhD in 1978 at the University of Washington in the field of Social Psychology. He has taught graduate and undergraduate courses in his field. His primary professional and research interest has been the social problems and preventive programs related to adolescents: teen pregnancy, drug abuse, and delinquency. His research has been published in scholarly professional journals and presented at meetings of the American Psychological Association, Academy of Management Association, Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, American Evaluation Association, National Conference on Family Relations, and World Conference of Sociologists. He has served as a consultant to the U.S. Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources, and as a consultant to the Office of Adolescent Pregnancy Programs in the Department of Health and Human Services. His work assessing the impact of current social policy on teen pregnancy has been cited on NBC TV and in The Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, Readers Digest, and scores of newspapers around the country. Dr. Weed has also been invited to present his work in Washington D.C. at The White House, the U.S. Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources, the U.S. House Committee on Health and Transportation, the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, to legislative bodies in several states, and at Moscow University in Russia. He has served as a national consultant for federal Title XX and CBAE projects, and was a charter member of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. He founded IRE in 1988 and currently serves as a senior fellow and chairman of the board of directors. |
| Paul Birch, MS, LMFT—Director & Project Manager |
| Mr. Birch has been with IRE since 2001 and was chosen as director in 2009. He was lead evaluator for a major national study of Community Marriage Policies® that was published in Family Relations, has made numerous professional presentations including speaking to the U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops, and recently participated as a technical consultant on the CDC’s task force for “Promoting a Public Health Approach to Sexual Health in the United States." Mr. Birch has manged evaluation projects in seven states from Alaska to New Jersey. He has also provided evaluation design, implementation, and analysis support to the Institute. His work emphasizes methodological rigor and state-of-the-science methods for accomplishing the purpose of research and evaluation, with a focus on data utilization for program development and improvement. His education includes a BS in psychology, an MS in marriage and family therapy, and he has nearly completed his PhD in psychology, with an emphasis in research and evaluation methodology. |
| Joseph White, PhD—Associate Director & Project Manager |
| Dr. White received his PhD from Texas Tech University in 1997 and joined IRE in 2007. He has worked in the prevention science field for over a decade developing and evaluating programs related to adolescent development, parenthood (especially focused on fatherhood), and drug and alcohol prevention in collaboration with American Indians from Dakota/Lakota tribes. Dr. White’s psychometric experience includes measures in use around the world. He has provided evaluation services and written academic and non-academic reports for a variety of programs including Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center’s “Southwest Institute for Addictive Diseases” in the Department of Neuropsychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Division of Psychiatry (an outpatient alcohol and drug treatment program), the U.S. Department of Education’s 21st Century Community Learning Center’s “Academic Recovery and Enrichment” after-school program, the USDA’s Children, Youth, and Families at Risk (CYFAR) programs, North Dakota State University’s “Father Times” newsletter, and fatherhood programs from a variety of Head Start and Early Head Start organizations across the Midwest. Dr. White’s work in the fatherhood field led to the publication of a co-edited book called Why Fathers Count: The Importance of Fathers and Their Involvement with Children. He has also conducted evaluation and assessments for the Native American Fatherhood and Family Association’s “Fatherhood Is Sacred” program. Finally, Dr. White has generated more than a half million dollars in funding from private (e.g., Rotary International, Bush Foundation), local (e.g., Sioux Falls Area Community Foundation), state (e.g, the State of South Dakota, South Dakota’s Department of Education, South Dakota State University) and federal (e.g., National Science Foundation, National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism) organizations. He has collaborated with many organizations around the country to accomplish his work. |
| Matt Evans, PhD—Associate Director & Project Manager |
| Dr. Evans joined IRE in 2007. He holds an Honors BA in English, a second BA in psychology, and a PhD in sociology. Dr. Evans was a successful teacher during his doctoral program and was given the rank of Visiting Assistant Professor after graduation. He has taught a variety of college classes, including both undergraduate- and graduate-level courses in qualitative research methods. He has also excelled as a scholar having published in professional journals (e.g., Review of Religious Research, and Rural Sociology) and having made a dozen presentations at the annual meetings of regional and national professional associations (including the American Sociological Association, Religious Research Association, Rural Sociological Society, Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, and Pacific Sociological Association). His professional experience also includes previous work as an editor and contract researcher/analyst. In addition to his duties as associate director, Dr. Evans manages evaluation projects in Nebraska, New Mexico, Puerto Rico, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. |
| Nicole Anderson, MS—Researcher & Project Manager |
| Ms. Anderson began working at IRE in 2002. Her responsibilities include project management, statistical analyses, scale development, and report writing. She is also an Adjunct Professor at Brigham Young University, teaching undergraduate psychology classes, as well as a research analyst at a market research company. Ms. Anderson completed her Bachelor’s of Science and Masters degrees in social psychology at Brigham Young University. |
| Irene Ericksen, MS—Researcher & Project Manager |
| Ms. Ericksen has worked in the field of applied social science research for 17 years, including 10 years with a large international corporation and 7 years with the Institute for Research & Evaluation. She has worked with large data sets designed for program evaluation purposes, and specifically with evaluation studies of abstinence education programs throughout the United States. She has been responsible for research design, measurement and survey development, analysis, report writing, client consultation, and for on-going review and synthesis of the research literature relating to the influences on adolescent sexual behavior and the effectiveness of sex education interventions for teens. She has an MS degree in educational psychology with emphasis in counseling and instructional product design. |
| David Andrews, ME—Production Manager |
| Mr. Andrews has been with IRE since 2003 and holds degrees in electrical engineering from Southern Illinois University. For 16 years he did electronic design work for specialized digital signal processors in aerospace, graphical processors for television animation, and medical diagnostic equipment. He spent nine years as a project engineer providing the primary customer technical support for a variety of government and civilian flight simulator programs. He spent an additional four years as a field applications engineer for several major national semiconductor manufacturers. His responsibilities at IRE include production of surveys, scanning support, AEGIS support, shipping, WebMIS support, and technical support for internal systems. |
| Judy Andrews, BA—Administrative Assistant |
| Ms. Andrews has been with IRE since 2006. She holds a BA in secondary education from the University of Utah and taught both middle school and high school for many years. Ms. Andrews did extensive work on the AEGIS curriculum, and is now in charge of accounts payable. She also handles travel arrangements and survey scanning. |
| Angie Boyce—Executive Assistant |
| Ms. Boyce is a paralegal who began working at IRE in 2008. She is Dr. Weed's executive assistant, and is also in charge of contracts, and accounts receivable. |
| Brenda Davis—AEGIS Character Education Coordinator |
| Ms. Davis joined IRE in 2009. She is in charge of AEGIS marketing and also handles survey scanning, among other duties. |