Dr. Leesa Kaplan has more than 35 years of professional experience in designing, developing, and leading education and training programs worldwide.  For the past 20 years, she has served as Chief of Party of nine USAID-funded programs in Latin America, Africa, and in both Central and Southeast Asia.  As COP, Leesa has been responsible for the leadership and supervision of the overall project; planning and implementation; budgeting and financial planning and management; staff management; technical oversight of all project components; design and implementation of monitoring and evaluation processes; management of project media and campaigns; project reports; and liaison with the donor, local government partners, and NGOs.

A longtime educator, Leesa has extensive experience teaching and facilitating in formal and non-formal settings as well as in the development of curricula and learning competencies, the design of instructional and training materials and assessment instruments and measures, and in the implementation of student achievement and teacher performance evaluations. 

In her spare time, Leesa loves hammering metal to make silver crafts.