Dr. Deborah Daro, Senior Research Fellow, is considered one of the nation’s leading experts in the area of child abuse prevention policy and early home visiting research. Her current work focuses on the unique and pivotal role early intervention programs, such as home visiting programs, can play in strengthening parental capacity across diverse populations, enhancing child development, and keeping children safe. Most recently, Daro’s research and writing have focused on developing reform strategies that embed individualized, targeted prevention efforts within more universal efforts to alter normative standards and community context. Daro developed and chaired the Doris Duke Fellowships for the Promotion of Child Well-Being, funded by the Doris Duke Charitable Trust from 2010-2020. In this capacity, she oversaw a network of over 100 young scholars from across the country that represents a diverse array of disciplines and research interests. A primary focus of the fellowship was assisting these young scholars in translating their academic research into relevant policy and practice reforms.

Daro has completed dozens of multisite evaluations over the past 40 years that have incorporated a range of research designs, including both randomized clinical trials and various quasi-experimental designs. More recently, her work has been guided by the growing realization among program evaluators, implementation scientists, and policymakers that a new balance is needed between effectiveness and efficacy studies when investing in program research to guide broad scale replication of evidence based program models. She has served on multiple national advisory boards and has received numerous awards for her contribution to the field of child abuse prevention.

Daro holds a PhD in Social Welfare and a master's degree in City and Regional Planning from the University of California at Berkeley. She has a bachelor's degree in communications from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.