Dr. Joanna Rubinstein has been appointed today to the position of assistant director of the Earth Institute for international programs. Rubinstein will help to lead the Earth Institute’s international programs for sustainable development, with a key role in coordinating the Earth Institute’s new role as Secretariat of the UN Sustainable Development Solution Network, an initiative under the auspices of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
Rubinstein has long been a leader of Earth Institute initiatives, most recently as chief of staff to the director, and director of the Center for Global Health and Economic Development. She assumes the new position at a time when the Earth Institute’s global initiatives are rapidly expanding, and will help in the design and implementation of a number of new global initiatives. In addition to helping to coordinate EI work with the UN, Rubinstein will support EI’s growing role with the Columbia Global Centers, and will continue her leadership of the Inter-Ministerial Program on Global Health and her engagement with the MDG (Millennium Development Goals) Advocates and the UNESCO/ITU Broadband Commission for Development.
“I know I speak for all of the Earth Institute in thanking Joanna for taking on this new leadership assignment,” said Earth Institute Director Jeffrey D. Sachs. “With the challenges of sustainable development greater than ever, and with the Earth Institute taking on a major new role on behalf of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, it is heartening that Joanna Rubinstein will add her considerable talents to this major new effort.”
Rubinstein is the first to hold the position of assistant director of the Earth Institute for International Programs. She brings a wealth of experience to this position, as PhD research scientist, a director at the Medical Research Council of Sweden, the director for research and post-graduate programs at Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, the senior associate dean for institutional and global initiatives at the Columbia University Medical Center, and director and manager of several important Earth Institute programs.
