Surya Associates International, Inc. supports clients in three ways:
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SAI can assist organizations in conducting market research for new lines of business or work in new countries or regions of the world. Services include historical analysis as well as contemporary analysis of trends, demand, and competition.
Once a decision is made to pursue new work, SAI can assist with strategic planning. This may include honing an organization's capabilities statement or developing strategic partnerships with other organizations.
SAI can also assist with proposal development in response to solicited, unsolicited, or free and open competitions. This includes conceptual development, proposal management, and writing.
SAI can assist in all aspects of project management--from initial design to start-up, to full implementation and close-out--to ensure that activities that lead to the greatest positive impact are sustainable over time.
Initial design includes the development of strategic plans with conceptual frameworks that describe key elements of the project and their inter-relationships; detailed activity plans that describe activities in timelines linked to human and financial resources; management structures and staffing plans that include lines of communication appropriate to ensure efficient and effective work; and performance monitoring plans to capture the most important measures of project success.
SAI can also guide project start-up and closeout activities. Examples include locating office space, completing lease agreements; procuring office services and equipment; developing job descriptions, advertising, and interviewing for staff positions; determining parameters for staffing contracts, benefits, and allowances; planning for staff transitions over time; creating and maintaining inventory logs; and establishing templates for project documentation and reporting.
As projects move beyond the start-up phase, SAI can support home office and field-based project managers, as well as other administrative staff in many aspects of project management. Services include executive coaching; performance monitoring; expenditure tracking; support for partner and client relations; staff professional development and performance review systems; and collaboration among government, private-sector, education, and non-profit sectors.
Last, SAI can help clients navigate government regluations. This includes basic guidance in normal and customary business procedures in the United States and abroad; government regulations regarding the establishment of new offices, taxes, and labor contracts; branding requirements and website compliance for U.S. government contracts and assistance awards; and protection of human subjects in federally-sponsored research.
SAI can provide technical assistance to support a number of programmatic areas in the United States and abroad. Examples include the following:
SAI specializes in educational programming to promote access for the most disadvantaged children, use of higher-order thinking skills among students, relevance of curriculum for students' lives, and civic-mindedness among all participants in an educational system. This includes work in classrooms, schools, communities, regional education offices, and ministries of education to support teacher professional development, curricular reform, and educational management. Services include presentations and workshops, small group and individual mentoring, curricular materials, and documentation and reporting.
SAI develops and executes performance monitoring plans to determine whether activities are achieving desired results and being implemented on time and on budget. Frameworks are designed to include indicators of success that are measurable and closely aligned with project goals. Measures are selected to be the best possible to inform project indicators and whose data can be collected efficiently and effectively. Whenever possible, the development of performance monitoring plans includes extensive dialogue with project implementers and stakeholders.
SAI also conducts two types of project evaluations: formative evaluations to inform project implementation and summative evaluations to determine project success. In both instances, evaluations begin with conceptual frameworks that attempt to discern the logical relationships between project activities and intended outcomes. SAI then collects and analyzes data, both quantitative or qualitative data as appropriate, to identify the connections between interventions and outcomes where connections exist.
Large governmental agencies can only achieve their missions if there is a good flow of information through the system. In the case of ministries of education (MOEs), for example, it is essential for planning and policy-making that central offices collect information about the students, classes, schools, and regions in the system. It is equally important that families, teachers, and school administrators have accurate information about student performance as well as more aggregated class and school data as well as central MOE policies. This flow of information can only be effective if accurate data are collected and analyzed efficiently and shared in a way that they can be used by different stakeholders in the system.
SAI can assist in assessing the effectiveness of information feedback systems and advising ministries and other large organizational bodies about how to strengthen systems' limitations. SAI can also assess the effectiveness of existing database management and information systems to ensure that ministries are acquiring the information they need to guide policy and planning. This includes evaluations of data collection instruments and processes, modeling more effective relational database structures, and developing and implementing data analysis plans.
Education systems often mirror their societies and reinforce the status quo. In totalitarian societies, for example, schools are often structured to promote rote learning Teachers often use didactic instructional methods, relying exclusively on direct instruction or "drill-and-kill" exercises. The culture in these classrooms promotes obedience and memorization. In contrast, the ideal in democratic societies (albeit not always practiced) includes exploration and the active participation of students with the instructor and each other. Education in democratic societies can challenge students to question prevailing views, think critically about choices, and think critically about solutions. It can also engage students in "service learning" to identify community problems and seek meaningful solutions.
SAI can work with school systems to promote democratic and civic principals in education. This includes the development of service learning curricula as well as evaluations of the effects of different instructional practices on students' critical thinking skills.
At some point in a corporation's development or a person's life journey, there is often interest in giving back or making a difference. Organizations and individuals have a lot to contribute to economic, social, and educational development in developing countries. Technical expertise and charitable donations are two examples.
SAI can advise about ways to make meaningful contributions to development, from targeted giving to more direct engagement with successful development initiatives. This includes assistance in identifying or establishing appropriate charitable organizations, interacting directly with outstanding service organizations in other countries, and evaluating risks and returns on social investments.
SAI develops and implements research programs to improve understanding of context and to increase performance. Staff work with clients to identify salient research questions; chart appropriate data-collection strategies; create surveys, inteview and focus-group protocols, observation tools, and other instruments that inform but do not overwhelm researchers; train data collectors to acquire reliable, consistent information; oversee data-collection efforts; ensure efficient and accurate data entry; analyze data to inform research questions and other emergent, unforeseen trends; and present research findings in a way that increases understanding of the results for key audiences.
SAI staff are proficient in computing descriptive and inferential statistics, multi-level analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, limited dependent variable analysis, and analysis of qualitative data using text-based analytical software.
P.O. Box 5 * Kensington, MD 20895-0005 * +1-240-505-3942 * +1-240-845-1095 (fax) * info@surya-associates.com