Jessie Evans '06

Jessie Evans is the Program Lead for Africa at the Institute for Security Governance at the US Department of Defense. She is responsible for managing institutional capacity building projects in the US Africa Command area of responsibility. She directs millions of dollars in US security cooperation funds to prepare senior military and defense leaders in sub-Saharan Africa to build national strategies, communicate with the public, and manage budgets and logistics in order to improve institutional capacity and operations. Previously Jessie served as a security sector reform advisor to the US Mission to Somalia in Mogadishu. She pushed for tough adjustments on US security assistance, spending countless hours with Somali defense officials and the US military to re-calibrate assistance. Prior she served the State Department as a Senior Conflict Specialist living overseas in Burma, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan. Jessie served as a Rosenthal Fellow with the Office of the Secretary of Defense focused on Africa policy, she is an advisor to the Women in International Security DC Chapter Board and the Truman National Security Project. While at Occidental, she interned in the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations on the West Africa desk. She has degrees from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and Occidental College and originally hails from Bend, OR.