Sawsan Al Refa

Dr. Sawsan Al Refai is an expert in Public Policy and Advocacy in the areas of women and gender equity and equality, diversity and inclusion. She is a technical advisor on gender and intersectionality, gender diversity and gender-sensitive data. She managed large scale programs and provided technical support to government institutions, civil society organizations, United Nations organizations and other international NGOs in the Middle East and East Europe in areas of gender and human rights based approaches to development, results based policy and advocacy. She has extensive experience working in design of M&E frameworks for national level organizations. She is also an expert in M&E of development programs and third party monitoring using both qualitative and quantitative techniques. She has considerable experience working in humanitarian settings and emergencies, and has designed, managed and evaluated a wide spectrum of large scope humanitarian interventions in areas of health & nutrition, water & sanitation, livelihood and protection with specific expertise on gender specific interventions targeting women and girls. Al-Refaei is a researcher and author in areas of social policy with special focus on women, peace and security, effectiveness of aid, and education. She is a founding member of the Arab Network for Civic Education and the founding member of the Arab Campaign for Education in the Arab region. She is also a member of the Yemen Pact for Peace and Security, a Yemeni women movement working on women & security issues. She is also the founder of Musnad Education Fund, a non profit fund dedicated for education in Yemen. Sawsan is a medical doctor by training and holds a Master’s degree in health policy, planning and financing, from London School of Economics, and a diploma in population and gender studies from University of Costa Rica. She is an accredited trainer in International Human Rights Mechanisms, Gender Mainstreaming and GBV response.