Testimonials

"Over a period of a year, Galen provided consultation and training to our Prevention Services Unit in research-based planning. With great humor and skill, she guided our staff and youth council to identify priorities and data needs, develop logic models, and design a youth-led research project that has put our prevention work on the map. This has noticeably increased our effectiveness and has allowed us to protect precious resources in a time when prevention dollars are shrinking."
—Kathy Delaney, Mariposa County Prevention Services

"When our 5-year initiative was just being launched we hired Galen's team to take on a key component, which was to train and coordinate 19 professional coaches who provided technical assistance to 39 community grantees. Galen and her team designed an innovative training program that was participatory, engaging and that prepared these coaches to assist our granteesin successfully achieving their first year goals. Galen has a clear and strongly insightful understanding of the role of technical assistance, and is highly competent in both designing the substance of training programs, supporting peer learning, as well as providing oversight and administration to a large and complex project. She is highly reliable, was flexible as our needs changed, and handled multiple tasks with ease and good humor. I believe she would be an asset to any program she assists."
—Julie Williamson, Partnership for the Public’s Health

"We hired Galen and her associate, Lisa Korwin, to assist us in developing a scope of work for our complicated grant proposal. Not only did they help us develop key sections of the proposal, they were also instrumental in guiding us toward key outcomes and measures using the logic model planning process. After meeting with us, listening closely and understanding exactly what needed to be done, they efficiently helped us focus our work with the deadline looming. Because vying for grant funding is a difficult proposition at best, it is a great testament to their work that with their assistance, our proposal was funded!"
—Bob Gordon, Coalition of Lavender-Americans on Smoking and Health

"I’ve worked with different consultants throughout the years but found Galen to be one of the best. I was so impressed with her vision, organizational skills and her overall understanding of our goals that I didn’t think twice about hiring her for our project. Galen is a great person to brainstorm ideas with; she is flexible in the planning process; very knowledgeable in her field; and comprehensive in her service delivery. I truly enjoyed working with her. I recommend Galen to any organization searching for a consultant in the area of education, training, and facilitation."
—Christine Nguyen, Asian Resources, Inc.

"In 2003, Galen El-Askari, in partnership with Sheryl Walton, provided excellent training to a small army of community volunteers for the largest-ever study of homeless people in a single metropolitan area. Culturally appropriate training was provided by a diverse team to a diverse group of homeless consumers, community members, service professionals, and executives. Not only did they provide excellent training materials and delivery, but they effectively partnered with and managed other consultants. Galen and her team were highly professional, demonstrated a strong work ethic, and rolled with scheduling glitches and timeline crunches with aplomb. Our lead researcher commented that the training they developed and implemented was, 'the most effective training of its type I’ve ever seen. I was impressed.' So are we!"
—Megan Schatz, Alameda County Homelessness Continuum of Care Council

"We were lucky enough to have Galen’s team work with us throughout both our planning stages as well as implementation. With her extensive experience and knowledge in the field, she always drew out and built upon our own capacity to plan and evaluate our programs. Galen developed a participatory process that engaged all our key stakeholders in understanding, analyzing, and interpreting both baseline data and subsequent evaluation data. It was empowering and exhilarating to work as a group to develop findings and recommendations based on a rigorous analysis of the data. It was such a benefit to have someone as an evaluator who was also a natural educator and facilitator."
—Catherine Condon, Marin County Alcohol, Drug, and Tobacco Services

"For the last 18 months, Galen has been part of a consultant team to assist our Maternal, Child, and Adolescent Health Program in developing a five year strategic plan to address racial and ethnic health inequities. We have been consistently impressed by Galen’s ability to creatively engage our staff in all levels of planning, from needs assessment to logic model evaluation planning. For example, Galen designed a brilliant training program that brought together community members and staff from our hardest hit census tracts to learn about, analyze, and interpret all kinds of data to determine priorities for our strategic plan. Not only did we actively engage with the data and each other, but we laughed a lot and had a tremendous sense of accomplishment."
—Vicki Alexander, City of Berkeley Maternal Child Adolescent Health