Professor Emerita
Beryl Levinger began her international development career as a Peace Corps Volunteer in rural Colombia. Since that time, she has worked on six continents and in more than 50 countries. Prior to coming to MIIS, Dr. Levinger held executive positions with Save the Children, CARE, and AFS Intercultural programs. Her consulting clients include a mix of intergovernmental organizations (e.g., UNHCR, the World Bank, the World Food Programme, the InterAmerican Development Bank); international NGOs (e.g., the Red Cross, Save the Children, Grameen Foundation, Project Concern International); and the U.S. government.
Dr. Levinger is passionate about innovation. Among the breakthrough ideas she has helped to shape over the course of her career are the highly acclaimed New School (Escuela Nueva) movement; InterAction, a major consortium of international development organizations; the national Peace Corps (Coverdell) Fellows program in 1983; Save the Children’s State of the World’s Mothers annual reports; and, more recently, the launch of Save the Children’s new annual index of “childhood enders”– events that rob children of their childhoods. She has also co-authored many widely used organizational capacity assessment tools. At MIIS, Dr. Levinger, working closely with Institute colleagues, has pioneered a number of pedagogical innovations including the Program in Design, Partnering, Management, and Innovation (DPMI), a hands-on intensive program in development practice.
My professional life blends teaching through experiential learning, research on capacity development, evaluation work, and a robust consulting practice. These activities have been shaped by two closely linked questions: (1) How do individuals, communities, and organizations become capable of meeting the challenges they face? (2) What makes a project or program “good”? Those two concerns have led me to current activities which include: helping an international group of cybersecurity practitioners to craft appropriate capacity development strategies; working with Colombia’s Graduate School of the National Police to develop post-conflict social and educational programs; and designing and facilitating an event to help Latin American policy makers create innovative initiatives to reach traditionally marginalized populations.
Professor Levinger has been teaching at the Institute since 1992.
International Policy and Development graduate Katia Mironova shares how her coursework and internship led to a career as a monitoring and evaluation professional in Washington, D.C.
MPA graduate Matthew Levie describes how coursework, internships, and support from MIIS faculty helped him on the path to becoming a senior analyst for the GAO.
| by Eva Gudbergsdottir
A vibrant community of Returned Peace Corps Volunteers—including more than 100 faculty, staff, and students—commemorates their service.
