Smita Singh is the Special Advisor for Global Affairs and Director, Global Development Program for The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.
Smita Singh is developing the Foundation’s new philanthropic program that addresses major global development challenges. Prior to joining the Foundation, she was a Scholar at the Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies. Smita’s research interests focus on the comparative political economy of developing countries, and she has consulted on projects for the World Bank and UN agencies like the UN Economic Commission on Africa. She has worked extensively with non-profits, government agencies and universities. She was the first Program Officer for Higher Education Innovative Projects at the Commission on National and Community Service, now called the Corporation for National Service. In that capacity, she was responsible for developing the Commission’s higher education initiatives and funding strategies for dispersing grants to community service and service-learning projects at over 200 colleges and universities. Singh served as a member of the White House team that developed the President’s Summer of Service program and she drafted the guidelines for the first Summer of Service in 1993. Before joining the Commission, Singh worked at ABC News Nightline, and prior to that, did action research with community-based women’s organizations in India. Singh did her undergraduate studies at Stanford University and her graduate studies at Harvard University.
