Bureau of Global Public
Affairs

Alumni@State

Candice Helton is a Public Affairs Specialist in the State Department’s Bureau of Global Public Affairs. In that capacity, she fosters relationships between Department officials and the American people to promote a deeper understanding of U.S. foreign policy. She leads the effort for the Department’s annual Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) Foreign Policy Conference. As a product of an HBCU, Winston-Salem State University (WSSU), she considers this the highlight of her career. She also earned a Master of Arts from Trinity Washington University. She serves as Vice President and Public Relations Chair of the WSSU DC-Metro Alumni Chapter. She is a member of the Thursday Network, the young professional auxiliary to the Greater Washington Urban League; Blacks in Government, Carl T. Rowan Chapter; and Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nicole Tillman is a Foreign Service Financial Management Officer currently serving in the Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations within the Financial Policy and Controls Team. She previously served in the Bureau of African Affairs’ Budget Office, at Embassy Kuwait, and at Embassy Beijing. Nicole started her career with the Department of State in 2009 as a Civil Service Budget Analyst in the Bureau of Budget and Planning. Before joining the Department, Nicole worked for the Inter-American Foundation, Georgetown University, the American Red Cross, and Capital One Bank. Nicole graduated from Hampton University, where she was a proud member of the Hampton University Marching Force. She is a resident of Brandywine, Maryland, where she enjoys spending time with her family and volunteering in the community.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lisa Ealy is a career coach and HR professional with over 25 years of experience. She has a proven track record in diverse industries, including, nonprofits, manufacturing, and health care, having led a private practice for 11 years delivering career coaching programs, workshops and one-to-one coaching. Her private practice has been dedicated to career development, strategies for entrepreneurs and business executives, leadership effectiveness, career planning, networking, and LinkedIn. Before this pivot in her career, she focused on human capital development, organization, innovation, talent, and workplace immigration. Lisa holds Master of Business Administration, Master of Theology, and Bachelor of Science degrees. She is a Senior Certified HR Professional through the Society for Human Resource Management. She is also a certified leadership coach with a diversity and inclusion certification. Lisa is a proud HBCU graduate, of Central State University, and a 30-year member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc.

 

 

 

 

 

Daniel K. Delk Jr. is the Deputy Principal Officer at the U.S. Consulate General in Shanghai. A member of the Foreign Service since 2004, Daniel most recently led the Political Section of the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad. His previous tours include service as Deputy Director of the Office of Taiwan Coordination; Crisis Management Coordinator in the Executive Secretariat; a Senior Watch Officer in the Operations Center; Mission China’s senior Human Rights Officer in Beijing; a language student in Taipei, Taiwan; Desk Officer and Staff Assistant in the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs; and Consular Officer in Guayaquil, Ecuador. Daniel earned a Bachelor of Arts in economics and Spanish from Morehouse College and a master’s in public policy from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. His foreign languages are Mandarin Chinese and Spanish. Daniel is married, with twin daughters and a son.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Foreign Service Officer since 2008, Jared Yancey is from Portsmouth, Virginia, and is a recipient of the Charles B. Rangel International Affairs Fellowship. He is currently the Deputy Director of the Orientation Division at the Foreign Service Institute. He has served overseas as a Consular Officer in El Salvador, Deputy Director for Public Affairs Field Programs in Afghanistan, Deputy Public Affairs Officer in Johannesburg, and Public Affairs Officer at the U.S. Consulate General in Lahore, Pakistan. His domestic assignments include serving as Desk Officer for Zambia and the former Swaziland; as Career Development Officer, Speechwriter, and Special Assistant in the Office of the Director General; and as a Senior Watch Officer in the State Department’s Operations Center. Jared earned a B.A. in international studies from Bethune-Cookman University and an M.A. in public and international affairs from the University of Pittsburgh.

The Great Powers' Interest in Africa: What Happens In Africa Does Not Stay In Africa

Learned Dees is a Foreign Service Officer with the Department of State. He currently serves as Country Affairs Coordinator for East Africa in the Bureau of African Affairs’ Office of Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, where he coordinates public diplomacy activities in 12 East African countries. Dees has worked at the State Department for 15 years and has served as the Human Rights and Democracy Officer in the Bureau of African Affairs, as Africa Coordinator in the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs’ Office of Communications and Information Policy, and as Coordinator for the Young African Leaders Initiative in its inaugural year. He has served at embassies in Singapore, Nigeria, and Ethiopia.

Before joining the State Department, Dees worked as a reporter for Stars and Stripes in Darmstadt, Germany, and the Concord Monitor in Concord, New Hampshire, and as a freelance journalist for Voice of America in Kinshasa, Zaire. He also worked as a regional deputy director at the National Endowment for Democracy, supporting civil society organizations. He started his overseas work as a Peace Corps volunteer in a rural village in Zaire, where he worked to expand the reach of the Peace Corps’ successful tilapia-based aquaculture program. He is also an adjunct lecturer at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), where he teaches a course in African politics and civil society. A proud Minnesotan, Dees has a B.A. in mass communications from Morehouse College and an M.A. in international relations from SAIS.

 

 

 

 

 

Angela Chang is a Foreign Affairs Officer in the Office of Chinese and Mongolian Affairs’ Global Unit, where she covers Africa and the Middle East. She was previously a Staff Assistant in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs’ Front Office. Before coming to Washington, Angela lived in China for 10 years, first studying and working at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies (HNC) and then serving as a Consular Officer at the U.S. Consulate General in Shanghai and the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. Angela received an M.A. in international studies and Chinese studies from the HNC and a B.A. in international and comparative studies and medieval and Renaissance studies from Duke University.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chris Geurtsen is a Political Officer in the State Department’s Office of Russian Affairs (RUS). Before joining RUS in September 2020, he served as an Economic Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Seoul, South Korea, covering macroeconomic policy, financial services, and information and communications technology. Before that, he was a Consular Officer in the American Citizen Services Section at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City.

Before joining the State Department, Chris spent two years as a USAID Field Program Officer in Afghanistan. He also previously worked in the World Bank Group’s Office of Private Sector Development, for the U.S. Peace Corps in Vanuatu, and at Duke University’s Center on Globalization, Governance & Competitiveness. He holds a bachelor’s degree in economics and history from the College of William & Mary and an MBA from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business.

U.S. Diplomacy In International Organizations

Tyrik “Ty” McKeiver serves as the Public Engagement and Outreach Officer at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations. Previously, he was the Vice President for Public Relations and Influence at Ogilvy. Before working at Ogilvy, Ty was Vice President for Global Strategy and Communications in the Global Financial Crimes Division at MUFG Bank Ltd. From 2017 to 2019, Ty was the Chief of Staff in the New York City Mayor’s Office for International Affairs, where, as the chief strategist, he promoted city diplomacy.

Before that, Ty was a political appointee in the Obama administration and served as a Senior Advisor at the U.S. Department of State in the Office of the Deputy Secretary for Management and Resources. He began his career in various legislative and public affairs capacities at the Departments of Homeland Security and Commerce and as a professional staff member on Capitol Hill.

Ty received a Master of International Affairs degree from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs and a bachelor’s degree from Florida International University.

 

 

Michael C. Hayes is a U.S. diplomat currently based in New York City at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations.

Overseas, Michael has worked in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico; New Delhi; and Windhoek, Namibia. In Washington, he served in the Office of Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs and in the Department’s Africa Bureau. Before joining the Department of State, he worked as a management consultant for Booz Allen Hamilton and as a fellow in the U.S. Congress. Michael holds a bachelor’s degree in communications from Clark Atlanta University, a master’s in international affairs from Columbia University, and a Master of Public Policy from Sciences Po in Paris. He is fluent in Hindi, French, and Spanish.

He is founder of the Cornelius Travelers Foundation, a nonprofit organization established to provide support for students at historically Black colleges and universities for international travel.

 

 

 

Desirée Cormier Smith is the Senior Advisor in the Bureau of International Organization Affairs at the U.S. Department of State. Previously, she was the Senior Policy Advisor for Africa, Europe, and Eurasia at the Open Society Foundations. In this role, she led the global foundation’s U.S. advocacy strategy and execution on a wide range of human rights issues. From 2015 until 2020, she was the Senior Director with Albright Stonebridge Group’s Africa Practice, where she advised and assisted private and social sector clients on growth strategies across the African continent.

Ms. Cormier began her career as a Foreign Service Officer with the U.S. Department of State, with assignments in Mexico, South Africa, and Washington. Ms. Cormier is the recipient of four Department of State Meritorious Honor Awards and the Thomas R. Pickering Foreign Affairs Undergraduate Fellowship. She is an alumna of the International Career Advancement Program and is a member of the 2019 class of the Next Generation National Security Leaders Fellowship at the Center for a New American Security. She was honored by New America as a 2020 Black American National Security and Foreign Policy Next Generation Leader and is a 2020 alumna of the New Leadership Council Washington, D.C., chapter. Ms. Cormier currently serves on the Advisory Council of Global Kids, an educational nonprofit aimed at inspiring underserved youth to pursue careers in public policy and global affairs, and on the Advisory Board of Shea Yeleen, a social enterprise dedicated to empowering women in West Africa and the U.S. Ms. Cormier is a Term Member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Ms. Cormier holds a B.A. in political science and psychology from Stanford University and an M.A. in public policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. She is proficient in Spanish and French.

 

Megan Johnson serves as Public Diplomacy Officer in the Bureau of International Organization Affairs, Office of Public Affairs and Outreach. Megan joined the State Department as a Foreign Service Officer in 2014. She has served in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Islamabad; and Washington. Before joining the State Department, Megan worked in higher education, with a focus on leadership. She completed her dissertation research on women’s access to education in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kali Jones is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service and has served in a variety of positions that span the globe. She is currently the Chief of Staff to the U.S. Representative to the United Nations. Prior to this role, Kali was the Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy Gaborone and the Diplomat in Residence at Tulane University. Her other international assignments include Ho Chi Minh City, Port-au-Prince, and Brasilia. In Washington, Kali worked in the Department of State’s Operations Center under former secretaries Rice and Clinton.

Before joining the Department, Kali was the Associate Director for Programs of the Ralph J. Bunche International Affairs Center, as well as a lecturer on constitutional law at Howard University. Her international journey started as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Madagascar. Kali is a graduate of Howard University and holds a J.D./MSPH from Tulane Law School and the School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine.

Administrators, Faculty, and Family: HBCU Alumni Testimonials of the Fulbright Scholar Program (After-Hours)

Dr. Carleitta Paige-Anderson is committed to enhancing the research and education capacities of historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs). Her academic journey began at Virginia Union University (VUU), a small, private HBCU and alma mater of her great-great-grandmother, where she developed a passion for basic science research and earned a B.S. in biology. After obtaining a Ph.D. from Wake Forest University and completing a postdoctoral fellowship at Johns Hopkins University, she returned to VUU. While there, she established a research program investigating biochemical signaling mechanisms in disease-causing bacteria and viruses. By leveraging her scientific expertise to integrate research into the academic curriculum, she was selected as a 2013–2014 Senior Fulbright Scholar to implement a course-based undergraduate research paradigm at Universitas Airlangga in Surabaya, Indonesia. At VUU, she also served as the Founding Director of the Center for Undergraduate Research, University College Dean, and Vice President for Student Development and Success.

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Rhonda D. Jones holds a doctorate and a master’s degree in U.S. history from Howard University and a master’s degree in library science from the University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill. She currently works as a Public Historian and Community Digital Archivist at the University of North Carolina–Greensboro; her research centers on the challenges of documenting intergenerational trauma and racial violence. An international scholar who specializes in the role of cultural memory and digital heritage informatics, Dr. Jones was selected as a 2018 Fulbright U.S. Scholar in American studies at the Université Cheikh Anta Diop in Dakar, Senegal, and now serves as a Fulbright Specialist and Alumni Ambassador.

 

 

 

 

Dr. Everette Penn earned his Ph.D. in criminology from Indiana University of Pennsylvania after earning a bachelor’s degree in political science from Rutgers University and a master’s degree in criminal justice from Texas A&M University–Central Texas. Dr. Penn works with nine programs in behavioral and cultural sciences. He is the Principal Investigator for the Teen and Police Service Academy, Department of Justice/COPS Office funded program (www.TAPSAcademy.org) and has authored dozens of publications on juvenile justice, race and crime, and homeland security. In 2005, he was named a Fulbright Professor of American Studies in Egypt. He served on the Board of Directors for the Fulbright Alumni Association between 2008 and 2013 and chaired the Diversity Task Force. He continues to teach graduate-level courses, including Race and Crime and Graduate Criminology Seminar and Internship.

 

 

 

 

 

Cydni Gordon joined the Fulbright Program Western Hemisphere Branch in the Office of Academic Exchange Programs in April 2020. Since joining the State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA), she has worked on South American and Caribbean portfolios and is a member of the Office’s Diversity and Inclusion Working Group. Cydni was a 2017 Fulbright Student Researcher to Argentina, hence the program is near and dear to her heart. She holds two bachelor’s degrees, in psychology and mass communications, with a double major in African American studies, and a certificate in global education from Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). While at VCU, Cydni studied abroad at VCU’s Qatar campus and in rural southern Mexico conducting qualitative research on migration motivators. She also worked closely with international students on campus as a mentor for English language learners, Iraqi Young Leaders Exchange Program students, and participants in Department of State programs, and she assisted in managing a 100,000 Strong in the Americas reciprocal exchange program with two institutions in Mexico.

 

 

Athena Mison Fulay is an education and cultural exchange leader with over 20 years of experience in international education. She created the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Alumni Ambassador Program and the Scholar Liaison Network to expand alumni and institutional engagement in the Fulbright Program. In 2013, Athena was appointed to lead the institutional engagement team, facilitating Fulbright engagement with underserved institutions across the United States. In 2018, she accepted leadership of the Fulbright Scholar Program outreach and recruitment team at the Institute of International Education (IIE). Before joining the Fulbright team, Athena served as an educator with the Peace Corps in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, where her projects included developing English-language curriculum and teacher training. Athena has worked at various arts organizations in Los Angeles and Washington. She received her M.A. in liberal studies from Georgetown University and a B.A. in European studies from Loyola Marymount University.

Career Session on Student Programs, Pt 2 (How To Get Started)

J. Nathan Bland is a Foreign Service Officer with over 17 years of experience in a wide variety of areas with the U.S. Department of State. He is currently the Diplomat in Residence based at Tulane University in New Orleans, where he is responsible for recruiting within Louisiana, Mississippi, and Arkansas.

His overseas postings include an assignment as the Political and Economic Section Chief at the U.S. Embassy in Belmopan, Belize. He was an Assistant General Services Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City, serving as the embassy’s primary Contracting Officer and overseeing logistics for VIP visits. Before that, he was the Public Affairs Officer at the U.S. Embassy to the Holy See, and his first assignment was as a Consular Officer at the U.S. Consulate in Shenyang, China. He began his career as a Presidential Management Fellow working in the Public Affairs Office of the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs.

 

 

 

Dr. Yolonda Kerney joined the U.S. diplomatic corps as a Foreign Service Officer in 2004. She served as Counselor for Public Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in the Democratic Republic of the Congo; Public Affairs Officer at the U.S. Mission to Barbados, the Eastern Caribbean, and the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States; Public Affairs Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Jamaica; Cultural Affairs Officer at the U.S. Embassy in the Republic of Cameroon; and Economic Officer and Chief Consul at the U.S. Embassy in the Republic of Guinea. She is the recipient of several Department of State Meritorious Honor and Superior Honor awards and the Lois Roth Award for Excellence in Cultural Diplomacy. Dr. Kerney is a proud alumna of Howard University, from which she earned undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral degrees in music history and literature, and religious studies. Before joining the Foreign Service, she served as a music historian at the U.S. Library of Congress.

Department of State Study Abroad Opportunities as a Path to Service, Policy, and Practice

Amelia VanderLaan is a Foreign Service Officer currently serving as the USA Study Abroad Outreach Officer in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. She previously served as the Assistant Public Affairs Officer at U.S. Embassy Cyprus, managing exchange and cultural programs, along with outreach initiatives. From 2015 to 2017, she served in Canada, heading the Investment Visa Section of the U.S. Consulate in Toronto. Before joining the Foreign Service, she was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to teach in Sinop, Turkey, for a year. She also advised students on pursuing international opportunities when she worked as a fellowship’s advisor at Smith College and served as a Teaching Fellow at Athens College. Amelia graduated from Smith College in 2009 with a B.A. in government. She received her M.A. from the University of Athens in Southeast European studies in 2013. She speaks Greek, Turkish, and Spanish.

 

 

 

 

Brandon Ramsay is a Foreign Policy Legislative Correspondent in the Office of U.S. Senator Chris Coons, where he covers the Middle East, with a special focus on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, sub-Saharan Africa, the Western Hemisphere, and veterans affairs. He received his master’s in security studies from the Georgetown University Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. During his graduate studies, Brandon served as an intern at the House Foreign Affairs Committee and Albright Stonebridge Group. Brandon received his bachelor’s degree in interdisciplinary studies from Howard University and has studied abroad in Morocco as a Critical Language Scholar, in Jordan as a Benjamin Gilman Scholar, and in Israel.

 

 

 

 

 

Alsace-Lorraine (Alsace) Gallop is the national scholarships and fellowships coordinator at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, the country’s largest historically Black university. In that role, she also serves as the Fulbright Program Adviser. Alsace has served as a selection panelist for the Boren Scholarship, the Gilman Program, and CLS. She has presented at the past three biennial conferences for the National Association of Fellowships Advisors on topics related to actively identifying, guiding, and supporting first-generation college students and underrepresented ethnic and racial minorities as candidates for nationally competitive and prestigious scholarships, fellowships, and internships.
During her nine years in the scholarship and fellowship advising field, Alsace has recruited and advised hundreds of students and alumni at North Carolina A&T State University, North Carolina State University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her student and alumni national outcomes for international awards include NC A&T State University’s first documented Fulbright Program grant finalist from among their alumni community and three Rangel SEP Scholars. Alsace recruited and advised UNC-Chapel Hill’s first Churchill Scholar in five years and first Marshall Scholar in nine years, as well as NC State’s first Truman Scholar in 15 years and their first Marshall Scholar in 10 years, who was also their first Black Marshall Scholar. Alsace earned a diploma from the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics, a B.S. in biological sciences as a Banneker/Key Scholar at the University of Maryland in College Park, and an MHA in health policy and administration with a focus in marketing from the School of Public Health (now the Gillings School of Global Public Health) at UNC–Chapel Hill.

 

 

Kashmiere Dotson is a 2021–22 Gilman Alumni Ambassador and Digital Representative. She currently works as the School Counselor at Colorado High School Charter GES. Major parts of her role include communicating with Spanish-speaking parents, advocating alternative education options, and helping students magnify their voices. In 2020, Kashmiere was offered a Fulbright ETA to teach English in Colombia, where she planned to utilize her TEFL Certification. Kashmiere served as an educational assistant at the Douglas County Student Support Center, where she first learned about alternative education and restorative justice practices as educational activism. In 2018, she earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in sociology and comparative women’s studies, with a film concentration and a Spanish minor, from Spelman College. Kashmiere studied Afro-Brazilian culture and Portuguese in Bahia, Brazil, as a Gilman Scholar in 2017. She aspires to become a travel filmmaker and research Black identities in other countries.

From The Yard To The Embassy: Former HBCU Student Leaders/ Athletes Turned Diplomats (After-Hours)

Mignon Houston is currently a Diplomat in Residence, recruiting for the State Department in Southern Florida, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. Her overseas assignments included the U.S. Consulate in Cape Town, South Africa; the U.S. Embassy in Manila, Philippines; the U.S. Embassy in Yaoundé, Cameroon; and the U.S. Consulate in Guadalajara, Mexico. Domestically, she worked in Washington for the Office of the Special Envoy for Sudan and South Sudan, as well as for the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs. She served two temporary duty assignments, in Madrid and in Libreville, Gabon. She received her undergraduate degree from Winston-Salem State University in 2004 as a double major in Spanish and mass communications and her master’s degree from the University of Delaware in 2006 in urban affairs and public policy. She grew up in North Carolina and is married, with a son named Atlas.

 

 

 

 

 

Deneyse A. Kirkpatrick is the Senior Advisor of the U.S. Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy and has served as the Public Affairs Officer at the U.S. Embassies in Angola and Niger. Other tours include São Paulo, Cairo, Baghdad, and the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs.
Deneyse is the recipient of the 2020 Public Diplomacy Association of America Achievement Award, the 2018 Edward Murrow Award for Public Diplomacy, and a Civilian Army Achievement Award for communication leadership during the 2017 ambush against U.S. service members. Deneyse holds a Master of Arts in Latin American studies from Georgetown University, a Bachelor of Arts from Howard University in communication, and a Certificate in Public Diplomacy from the University of Southern California. She is proud to call Prairie View, Texas, home and is married, with three children.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bruce Baldwin is a Foreign Service Specialist, serving as a Special Agent for the past 13 years. He is currently a supervisory special agent with the Diplomatic Security Service, assigned as a Branch Chief in the Office of Antiterrorism Assistance, charged with overseeing the delivery of approximately 150 counterterrorism training courses annually to partner nations globally.

As a Special Agent, he has worked domestically and abroad protecting our national security and ensuring that his diplomatic colleagues can conduct diplomacy safely and securely anywhere in the world. Over the course of his career, he has served in domestic and overseas assignments that focused on investigations, protection, and managing and leading security programs and policy. His domestic assignments included the Washington Field Office, the Office of Protective Intelligence Investigations, being the Diversity and Inclusion Officer, and work in the High Threat Programs Directorate as a desk officer covering Tunisia, Libya, Yemen, and Syria. Bruce’s overseas assignments included service as Assistant Regional Security Officer in Khartoum, Sudan, and Kampala, Uganda, and most recently as the Deputy Regional Security Officer in Algiers, Algeria.

Before his service with the Department of State, Bruce worked as a pension investigator with the Department of Labor, a contract specialist with the Department of Defense, and a minor league baseball player for the Colorado Rockies. Bruce received his Bachelor of Science in management, with a minor in criminology, and his master’s in public administration, concentrating on administration of justice, from George Mason University in 2005 and 2007, respectively. In November, he completed a one-year executive leadership program from the Naval Postgraduate School’s Center for Homeland Defense and Security. He mostly grew up in South Florida and is married with two daughters.

 

Donyá Eldridge joined the U.S. Department of State in 2010 with prior experience in the private and nonprofit sectors. Ms. Eldridge is currently the Assistant Cultural Affairs Officer (ACAO) in Mexico City. She previously served as the ACAO in Cairo, the Regional Social Media Coordinator and Arabian Peninsula Public Diplomacy Desk Officer for Near Eastern Affairs in Washington, and the Public Affairs Officer in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. During her first tour as a Consular Officer in Trinidad and Tobago, she also served as Chargé d’Affaires in Grenada.

Ms. Eldridge is a Thomas R. Pickering Graduate Foreign Affairs Fellow. She interned in the International Labor and Corporate Social Responsibility Office in Washington and in the Public Affairs Office in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in international business and Japanese studies from Dillard University and a Master of Arts in international politics and human rights from American University. She is a proud aunt of one niece and five nephews.