Alexandra Kotowski (Zimbabwe)

Alex is a Master of Public Administration student at Columbia University’s School of International & Public Affairs, where she studies Human Rights & Humanitarian Policy with a focus on gender. At SIPA, Alex is a graduate research intern with UNICEF, in which capacity she works on the intersection of child protection and gender-based violence prevention in humanitarian emergencies. Before coming to Columbia, Alex spent five years at Human Rights Watch, first as a Development & Outreach Associate and later as a Senior Associate for the Women’s Rights Division. At Human Rights Watch, she supported research and advocacy on a range of women’s rights issues, including gender-based violence, reproductive and maternal health, women and girls in humanitarian emergencies, the rights of indigenous women, and child marriage. Alex also conducted field research on the water crisis on First Nation reservations in Canada. Alex holds an undergraduate degree in Comparative Politics from Wesleyan University, where she wrote her honors thesis about Roma political mobilization and the far right in Europe. She has also interned at Amnesty International, the Legal Aid Society of New York, and the Romedia Foundation, which is a Roma rights organization in Budapest, Hungary.