Sara Lindberg

Sara Lindberg is the Director of the Evaluation Research Group at the Population Health Institute, as well as a faculty member in the Department of Population Health Sciences and the Masters of Public Health program. She has extensive experience in conducting and overseeing program evaluation and evaluation research efforts. In her role as Program Director for Evaluation Research, Sara leads a team of ~30 professional evaluators. The team uses a broad range of methods – from qualitative and descriptive techniques to complex experimental and quasi-experimental trials – to evaluate programs and interventions designed to improve the health of individuals and communities. Sara and the Evaluation Research Group collaborate with partners in numerous UW-Madison schools, departments, and institutes, as well as with partners outside the university, including community organizations, schools, tribal governments and programs, representatives of the healthcare industry, and governmental organizations. The team has extensive experience conducting program evaluation for prevention, intervention, treatment, and health policy projects. 

Dr. Lindberg is a developmental psychologist and epidemiologist by training. Her professional career and publishing have centered around the application of her methodological expertise to improve understanding of real-world problems and programs. Prior to joining the Population Health Institute in 2015, Sara spent more than fifteen years conducting a wide array of applied research and evaluation projects. Sara’s research experience started while she was an undergraduate at Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota. After graduation, she served as an Intern doing cognitive neuroscience research at the National Institutes of Health. She then returned to the Midwest, to UW-Madison, and completed a PhD in Developmental Psychology, followed by a MS in Population Health Sciences and a Postdoctoral Fellowship in Health Disparities Research. Prior to joining UWPHI in 2015, Dr. Lindberg worked as a scientist in the UW-Madison Center for Women’s Health and Health Disparities Research, where she also participated in the NIH-funded Building Interdisciplinary Research Scholars in Women’s Health (BIRCWH) program. Across these varied experiences, she has conducted epidemiological, clinical, community-based, health services, and implementation research. At the core of her work is a passion to use her methodological skills in support of efforts that improve opportunities for all people to achieve health and well-being.

Some of the evaluation projects that Sara currently leads or contributes to include: Wisconsin Obesity Prevention Initiative, Breast Cancer and the Environment Program, Legacy Community Alliance for Health, National Children’s Center for Rural and Agricultural Health and Safety, Lifecourse Initiative for Healthy Families, Partnership for Success 2015, Wisconsin Adolescent Health Systems Building Initiative, Wisconsin State Injury and Violence Prevention Program, Team Nutrition 2016 Nutrition Education and Promotion Program. Descriptions of these evaluation projects can be found here.

Sara’s publications can be viewed on PubMed or Google Scholar.