Sheryl Cates Email and Phone Number

Sheryl Cates is deputy program director of the Science in the Public Sphere Program at RTI International. She has more than 25 years of experience managing projects to provide support for and analyze the impacts of policies, regulations, and other initiatives in the areas of nutrition, obesity, and foodborne illness prevention. She has managed projects for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Food Safety and Inspection Service (USDA, FSIS); the USDA Food and Nutrition Service (FNS); the Food and Drug Administration (FDA); and other clients and conducted grant research funded by USDA. She has experience developing complex study designs, developing and testing survey instruments, developing interview and focus group protocols, conducting and analyzing in-depth interviews and focus groups, managing large-scale data collection efforts, and conducting qualitative and quantitative data analysis. She has conducted research to design and evaluate government campaigns to improve food safety practices, develop and test health communication materials on foodborne illness prevention for at-risk groups, and assess consumer use and understanding of food labels. Additionally, Ms. Cates has managed three large-scale multiyear evaluation studies on nutrition education in the SNAP and WIC programs for FNS. She has authored or coauthored more than 80 project reports and policy briefs. She has published her research in over 40 articles in peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, Journal of Nutrition in Gerontology and Geriatrics, and Journal of Food Protection and has presented her research at numerous professional conferences.