Grace Atukpawu-Tipton, Ph.D., M.S.W.
Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; Senior Research Associate
Grace Atukpawu-Tipton has more than 20 years of experience in program evaluation, evaluation technical assistance, and applied social science research in the fields of child welfare, child and family development, education, and psychology.
Atukpawu-Tipton leads JBA’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Initiative. She also leads the development of issue briefs, videos, and blog posts for the National Home Visiting Resource Center and the program consultation component of the study on Supporting Family Economic Well-Being Through Home Visiting. She provides evaluation technical assistance to home visiting grantees through the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting Technical Assistance Resource Center and serves as a member of the Home Visiting Applied Research Collaborative. Previously, Atukpawu-Tipton led the fidelity assessment and process evaluation for the HealthySteps Outcome Pilot Project. She was the project director and site liaison for the Implementation and Cost Evaluation of a Two-Generation Strategy project and part of the research team for the Mother and Infant Home Visiting Program Evaluation-Strong Start project.
In the area of child welfare, Atukpawu-Tipton facilitated a podcast series on approaches and methods to apply racial and ethnic equity principles in child welfare research and evaluation. She served as a technical assistance liaison and evaluator for the Cross-Site Evaluation of the Family Connection Discretionary Grants. She also provided technical assistance to Children’s Bureau grantees on foster family recruitment and educational stability.
Prior to joining JBA, Atukpawu-Tipton conducted research on the psychosocial development of youth in foster care as they transitioned to independent living. She was also a Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) for children in the child welfare system and worked with children in foster care and group homes as a social worker for the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services.
Atukpawu-Tipton received a Ph.D. in educational psychology from Stanford University and an M.S.W. from the University of California, Los Angeles.