Alumni Directory Display

she/her/hers

Claire Baney has consistently committed her work to environmental sustainability and community impact. She graduated from Purdue University in 2022 with degrees in Agricultural Economics and Agricultural Communication, ultimately developing specialties in sustainable food systems, community development, and environmental policy. Through her tenure as Indiana FFA State President and two-time National FFA Officer Candidate, she worked with local farmers, agricultural policy, and industry-leading agriculture companies. Later, Claire supported the state of Indiana’s agbioscience venture and startup ecosystem through talent development pipeline building and partnerships with global agtech accelerators. She channeled her experiences into building a regenerative farm and pursuing socioeconomic research on sustainable food systems and food access – a project awarded by Purdue University’s top 4 internationally ranked agricultural economics department. Most recently, Claire managed operations and partnerships for a tech startup bringing digital annotation solutions to highly regulated industries. Claire sees economic development and sustainable food systems as key components of lasting communities. As an Indiana native, she has steadfastly worked in her home state though understands that change in one community is not enough. As a result, Claire has worked on rural development projects in Ireland and intends to continue supporting community-driven growth internationally through bottom-up development, entrepreneurship, and policy. Following Princeton in Africa, Claire plans to pursue graduate school and continue building her career within environmental policy and impact venture capital to fuel climate change resilience solutions, expand food access, and strengthen local economies.

Fellow Bio:

Audrey Banks was a Princeton in Africa Fellow with the International Rescue Committee in Sierra Leone from 2008 – 2009. Following her fellowship, she went on to work with the IRC in Afghanistan, Jordan, Iraq, and South Sudan, where she focused on human rights protection and emergency response programming until 2015. She is now an “International Ninja” on the legal team at Palantir Technologies, a company that builds software platforms designed to enable organizations to analyze data at scale. At Palantir, Audrey’s work includes international expansion and corporate governance, privacy and civil liberties matters, and contracts related to Palantir’s philanthropic engagements with UN agencies and NGOs. Audrey holds a B.A. in History from Princeton University and a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

he/him/his

Michael Banks holds bachelor’s degrees in journalism and international affairs, with minors in business and anthropology from the University of Georgia. His interdisciplinary education spanned four colleges at the university, driven by a curiosity about cultural formation and cross-cultural interactions, particularly through media and business channels. At UGA, Michael conducted research on the impact of US foreign aid in Africa and educational disparities in post-Apartheid South Africa, igniting his interest in international development. He gained valuable experience in media strategy and healthcare communications while collaborating with health equity advocates in West Africa and the Caribbean through work with the United Nations Foundation’s United to Defeat Malaria team. He proposed a restructuring of McKinsey & Company’s Careers Blog to underscore colleague and talent narratives of the firms’ offices in Africa, Asia, and Latin America as one of their inaugural communications interns, and he explored how the higher education research ecosystem on the continent can inform STEM partnerships between the US & African states through work with the US State Department. Michael hopes to pursue a career in international development that joins his passion for cultural advancement with his varied experiences in communications across the private, public, and non-profit sectors. Outside of work and academia, Michael is a classically-trained singer, former long-distance swimmer turned gym-goer, and an aspiring polyglot.

Melissa received her A.B. degree in Social Studies from Harvard University and master’s degree with distinction in Development Studies from Cambridge University.  Her academic work has focused on the intersection of health and politics, and she has additionally worked on access to medicines advocacy and research with the MSF Access Campaign, the Harvard School of Public Health, Universities Allied for Essential Medicines, the Health Global Access Project in Nairobi, the Student Global AIDS Campaign, and is a commissioner for the Lancet Youth Commission on Essential Medicines Policies. Prior to joining CHAI, she was a consultant at the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria, focusing on advocacy and support to key populations in the context of transition from funding.

Alumni Update:

Nate is a PhD student in economics at Yale University. His research involves work on migration, urbanization and risk, mostly focused on Africa. He currently has active work fieldwork being conducted on in Ghana and Tanzania. he is mostly in the United States, but makes fairly regular trips to Ghana.

Fellow Bio:

Nate Barker is originally from Vancouver, WA, and is a graduate of Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. While at Georgetown, he majored in International Economics and received a certificate in International Development. During his time as a Hoya, he studied in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and worked in consulting in La Paz, Bolivia. In his free time, Nate enjoys reading, and playing and watching soccer and basketball. He is thrilled about the chance to be working in Kenya next year, where he hopes to pick up Swahili, climb Mount Kenya, and contribute to micro-enterprise development with The BOMA Project.

Elise is from Brookfield, VT and majored in International Politics with a concentration in International Security and a Certificate in African Studies while she attended Georgetown University. During her time at Georgetown, Elise had the opportunity to study abroad in Paris, France and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. She loved both experiences, especially exploring new cultures and getting to use French and Swahili. In Tanzania, she interned for Chipua Institute for Social Transformation, and when she returned to the U.S. she worked at the Woodrow Wilson Center in their Africa Program and Project on Leadership and Building State Capacity. In her free time, Elise likes listening to music, hiking, laughing, learning new languages, and adventuring. She cannot wait for the opportunity to explore a new culture in Ethiopia, eat delicious food, learn Amharic, and meet amazing new people.

Alumni Update:

David graduated from Harvard Medical School in 2013 and is completing an internal medicine internship. Then, he will start his Anesthesiology, Critical Care, & Pain Medicine residency training at Massachusetts General Hospital. He and Devan Darby (also a PiAf 2006-07 Fellow) got married in June 2014 in Virginia.

Fellow Bio:

David graduated from Princeton in 2006 with degrees in Geosciences and African Studies. He worked with the Baylor College of Medicine International Pediatric HIV/AIDS Initiative in Lesotho from 2006-07. He then worked with Dr. Christopher J.L. Murray at the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington and the Harvard Initiative for Global Health on a World Bank-funded road traffic injuries project and the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2010, which was published in the Lancet in December 2012. He graduated from Harvard Medical School with his MD in 2013, and will be pursuing Anesthesiology, Critical Care, and Pain Medicine residency training at Massachusetts General Hospital. His interests include health system management, health metrics, peri-operative systems, trauma care, critical care, pediatric, acute pain, and regional anesthesiology, and global health.

Alumni Update:

Joanna is working as an M&E Officer at Healthy Learners managing data systems and analytics/reporting. She lives in Lusaka, Zambia where she first arrived through her PiAf fellowship in 2019. 

Fellow Bio:

Joanna graduated from Calvin University with Honors in Economics with a minor in International Development Studies. Her curiosity about the world and the systems that shape people’s lives grew throughout her childhood and high school years spent in Michigan, Eritrea, and Ethiopia, as well as her experiences volunteering at the U.S. Embassy of Ethiopia, the African Women’s Entrepreneurship Program, and Hope Microfinance in Ethiopia. During her undergraduate career, she studied equity, access, and inclusion in the classroom and through interning at Inclusive Performance Strategies, organizing campus-wide programming on the Multicultural Student Advisory Board, and attending the Justice Studies Semester Program in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Prior to her Princeton in Africa fellowship, Joanna worked as a Research Specialist at the Center for Social Research where she collaborated with nonprofit, academic, and public-sector organizations on research projects involving data analytics, GIS mapping, community listening sessions, and database management. Here, she learned the power of data-based decisions and participatory research. Joanna is thankful for the opportunity to join the Monitoring and Evaluation team at Healthy Kids/Brighter Future and live in Lusaka! She looks forward to exploring new places through her favorite ways: being outdoors, dancing, and discovering cuisines.