As a Field Manager, Dara leads the recruitment and hiring of coordinators and enumerators, assists in developing training materials, and supports the project team in conducting pilot tests of data collection instruments. Prior to joining IDinsight, Dara was a Science Research Specialist at the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine, where she led the patient recruitment phase of two clinical studies: one on the seroprevalence of SARS-CoV-2 in the Philippines and the other on the evaluation of saliva as an alternative specimen for COVID-19 detection. Early in her career, she provided technical expertise for various environmental projects concerning mangroves and phytoplankton. Dara holds a bachelor’s degree in Biology from the University of the Philippines Los Baños and a Graduate Diploma in Environmental Science from the University of the Philippines Diliman.