Liz Gearan is a nutrition researcher who specializes in evaluating federal nutrition assistance programs, with a focus on the school meal programs. She is an expert in analyzing nutrition-related outcomes for menu and dietary intake data, including Healthy Eating Index scores, usual intakes, food choices, and food sources of nutrients.
Gearan has played key roles on long-standing, comprehensive evaluations of the school meal programs for the Food and Nutrition Service, including the School Nutrition Dietary Assessment Studies and the School Nutrition and Meal Cost Studies. On these projects, Gearan assessed whether school meals meet federal nutrition standards and examined the contribution of school meals to children’s diets. Among her other projects, she studied the diet quality of individuals participating in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, and the Title III-C Nutrition Services Program for older adults.
Before joining Mathematica, Gearan was a pediatric nutritionist at Uphams Corner Community Health Center in Massachusetts. She holds an M.S. in nutrition and health promotion from Simmons College and is a former registered dietitian.
Updated nutrition standards called for in the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 (HHFKA) have made school meals significantly healthier, according to a recent article.
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