WomenStrong International Announces Dr. Chisina Kapungu as New Executive Director

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--WomenStrong International is thrilled to welcome Dr. Chisina Kapungu as their new Executive Director, effective immediately. Dr. Susan M. Blaustein, the global gender equity organization’s founder and longtime leader, will remain as Chair and President of the Board and Strategic Advisory Council.

“Chisina is exactly the right person to lead WomenStrong at this moment,” said Dr. Blaustein. “She has built trust and mutual respect among our community of partner organizations from Cambodia to Rwanda to Guatemala. Her passion for equity and justice, and her determination to advance the rights and empowerment of women and girls worldwide, are unparalleled and unstoppable.”

Dr. Kapungu previously served as WomenStrong’s Director of Learning and Partnerships. She has nearly 20 years of experience as a clinical psychologist, community-based researcher, and program developer with special expertise in adolescent health, sexual and reproductive health, and HIV/AIDS. Prior to joining WomenStrong, she served as Senior Gender and Youth Specialist at the International Center for Research on Women.

“I am deeply honored to step into this role at such a critical time, and to work alongside WomenStrong’s incredible team and partners to advance gender equity,” said Dr. Kapungu. “We will continue to address the challenges ahead in women’s rights, and more broadly, in human rights. I am inspired by WomenStrong’s mission to move power, money, and resources to women-led organizations worldwide.”

WomenStrong’s current partner organizations work in the areas of girls’ education, reproductive health, violence prevention, and economic security, across Asia, Africa, and the Americas. In early 2025 the nonprofit will launch a new cohort of partners focused on climate and environmental justice.

“Our partners have unique expertise creating effective, sustainable solutions to the many issues facing women and girls. I look forward to working with them in solidarity to make sure their voices are heard, and to make the world that they envision into a reality,” said Dr. Kapungu.

About WomenStrong International: Founded in 2014-15, WomenStrong grew out of The Millennium Cities Initiative at Columbia University’s Earth Institute. Over that project’s course, Dr. Blaustein and her colleagues repeatedly observed that local women leaders knew precisely what their communities needed in order to thrive, but lacked the technical and financial resources to realize their solutions. Dr. Blaustein founded WomenStrong as a 501©3 to provide them unrestricted funding, capacity strengthening, peer learning, and amplifying partners’ solutions on regional and global platforms.