Tamar has a BA in Social Sciences from Tbilisi State University and an MA in Development Studies from the University of Sussex, for which she was awarded a Joint Japan/World Bank Graduate Scholarship. She has worked on different aspects of social policy and on range of development initiatives in Georgia, Armenia and Uzbekistan. Recently, she served as the Head of the Monitoring, Evaluation and Programme Design Division at the Ministry of Health and Social Affairs in Georgia, where she was in charge of country-wide social support and care services for victims of gender-based violence, children and adults with disabilities, and the elderly. She led a programme to build capacities and improve institutional mechanisms in the healthcare sector to respond to gender-based violence, and provided oversight on HIV and TB prevention and treatment programmes as the Chair of the Oversight Committee of the Global Fund’s Country Coordination Mechanism in Georgia. She has extensive experience in working with international development organisations, including UNDP, UNFPA, the Asian Development Bank and Médecins du Monde. Tamar intends to use her studies at Oxford to increase the influence of impactful research in social policy making at the governmental level. Â
