Bethel College’s 2014 Young Alumnus Award winner has dedicated her life to peacemaking and conflict resolution, especially with issues that affect women in the developing world.
Palwasha L. Kakar ’99, Woodbridge, Va., just completed four years with the Asia Foundation, based in Kabul, Afghanistan. From January 2013-January 2014, she was the Foundation’s director of women’s empowerment and development programs.
At the end of January, she joined the staff of the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C., as senior program officer for religion and peacemaking.
Because of her new job and busy travel schedule, Kakar’s Young Alumnus Award presentation, originally scheduled for March 14, has been moved to April 14 and will be at 7:30 p.m. (rather than during the regular morning convocation slot) in Krehbiel Auditorium. The public is invited.
The event will be co-sponsored with the Kansas Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution as one of their periodic Peace Lectures.
Kakar was born in Seattle to medical-student parents — father from Afghanistan, mother from Iowa. When it was time for her to go to college, she chose Bethel, the alma mater of her grandmother, the late Ruth (Smith) Graber, class of 1946.
Kakar did her undergraduate work in global studies, and Bible and religion, graduating in 1999 with a bachelor of arts degree.
Among the benefits of her Bethel liberal arts education, Kakar is quick to credit the opportunity for gaining practical mediation skills through KIPCOR.
Her first job upon graduation was director of the Newton Area Peace Center, which is now Peace Connections.
For more of this article, visit http://www.bethelks.edu/news-events/news/post/4980/.