Celeste Tarricone
Celeste Tarricone is a program officer in the Monitoring and Evaluation Division of Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), where she works in the development of monitoring systems and impact evaluation design during compact development and implementation.
Tarricone ’s work involves four countries — Georgia, Mozambique, Nicaragua, and Vanuatu. The MCC is a U.S. government-owned corporation responsible for the stewardship of the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA). The MCC is purposely designed as a small corporation to promote, support and ensure accountability for the innovative foreign aid strategies it administers.
Tarricone came to MCC in April 2005 from USAID, where she worked in the Bureau of Policy and Program Coordination on strategic planning and performance management projects. Prior to working in development, she was a journalist for several years, writing for the Providence Journal in Rhode Island, the Buenos Aires Herald and the Associated Press in Argentina and Mexico. She was a 2002 recipient of the Inter-American Press Association fellowship, which sent her to work and conduct research in Mexico, where she wrote for the AP and studied the impact of agricultural and land reforms on the rural poor.
Tarricone holds a B.A. in history from Brown University and an M.A. in international affairs, with a concentration in development economics, from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. She is fluent in Spanish and Portuguese.