Laura N. Henderson

Laura is the Director of Education at Women Thrive Worldwide, and her current work focuses on enabling voices of global south civil society organizations to directly influence the post-2015 development agenda related to education. Her career has taken her to 25 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America. As a strong gender equity advocate, Laura was one of a few gender experts that collectively met with the Obama Transition Team in January 2009 to make several gender integration related recommendations, most of which were adopted. Laura served as a Commissioner for the Montgomery County Commission for Women, and as a member of the Executive Committee of InterAction’s Board of Directors. Prior to Women Thrive Worldwide, Laura spent well over a decade accomplishing transformational change while in senior leadership positions with WWF, ChildFund International and CARE. As a Peace Corps Volunteer/Cooperatives Extension Agent in Togo, she advocated for women’s empowerment, enabling women to hold senior leadership positions within the agricultural cooperatives with which she worked. Laura earned her Masters in International Relations from Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.