Anjum Khalidi graduated from Syracuse University in December 2005 a semester early. She pursued a double major in Economics and International Relations with an interest in South Asia and gender and development issues. Throughout her college career she was a Board member of the Economics Club which organized an annual debate between professors on relevant economics issues in addition to other support services to undergraduate students of economics.

She was in the honors program and also an active member of Habitat for Humanity. She also sought to enrich her academic work with internships that gave her practical experience in the fields which she was studying. During her first two years of college she worked with Project Enterprise (www.projectenterprise.org) which is a Grameen Bank replica working to provide microfinance to low-income entrepreneurs in New York City. Also in the field of microfinance, she worked with the Microcredit Summit (www.microcreditsummit.org) in Washington, DC which works in global advocacy of microfinance practitioner issues and works to find ways to measure microfinance’s impact in eradicating poverty worldwide.

Anjum also spent two semesters off campus. The first was the Washington International Relations Semester during her sophomore year where, in addition to her classes, she interned with GlobalGiving (www.globalgiving.com), a civil society NGO, founded by two former World Bank executives, which seeks to change the way international aid works by channeling funds directly to community-based development projects around the world. The second semester off campus was during her junior year through a study abroad program in rural India. In addition to taking classes focused on development in India, she interned with a local NGO (www.cecoedecon.org) that had provided microfinance services for the socio-economic empowerment of its members.

Both of these experiences, learning about international development and policy making both in Washington, DC and during her semester abroad in India had helped strengthen her interest in working in this field after college. Graduating a semester early allowed her to accept a position with the American NGO, CARE (www.care.org) working in its New Delhi office. There she was a part of the microfinance program, working specifically on its research and advocacy portfolio. Later she moved on to work in CARE’s overall policy and advocacy unit, to gain a larger-perspective picture of development issues and programs in India.

After CARE, she joined the UN system in India, where is currently now working, in a Knowledge Management project. The project, called Solution Exchange (www.solutionexchange-un.net.in) is a joint initiative of all of the UN agencies in working in India as part of the larger UN reform goals which seek to harmonize the work and efforts of the UN agencies to be more relevant and effective for the countries it works with. The project is increasingly becoming more relevant and necessary as the Government of India becomes less dependent on donor funds and is instead more interested in the UN’s role as a knowledge broker to add expertise and value to the existing work the Government of India is doing to eradicate poverty and meet the MDG goals.

Her studies at Syracuse University combined with her experience working with these organizations working in the area of poverty alleviation has led her on the path of public service.