Asif Chaudhry, PhD is a Pakistan-born American who served as U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Moldova from 2008 to 2011, where he led the implementation of numerous economic development and reform programs that put the country on a path of transformation to a true democracy. In his final assignment with the U.S. government he was the Vice President of the Commodity Credit Corporation, managing a $5.5 billion portfolio of credit guarantee programs. Ambassador Chaudhry became the Vice President for International Programs at Washington State University in June 2015. He speaks Russian, Arabic, Polish, Urdu, and Punjabi, and received a Presidential Meritorious Service Award for his contributions in the conduct of U.S. Foreign Policy.
Ex officio: Soemadi Brotodiningrat is a descendant of Java’s Mangkunegara and Pakubuowono royal families who served as Indonesia’s ambassador to the U.S., Japan, the UN, and the World Bank, and held a variety of other senior roles in the Foreign Ministry. He is currently an advisor to the Indonesian government and Independent Commissioner, PT Bank DBS Indonesia.
Lawrence Pintak, PhD is an award-winning journalist, academic leader, and media development expert who has managed more than $50 million in donor funds, including more than $10 million in U.S. government grants. He was founding dean of The Edward R. Murrow College of Communication at Washington State University, dean of the Graduate School of Media and Communications at Aga Khan University in East Africa, and directed the Arab world’s leading journalism training center at The American University in Cairo. He spent ten years as a consultant to the U.S. Department of State, overseeing the U.S. government’s largest single public diplomacy grant in Pakistan. He holds a PhD in Islamic Studies.
Margaretha Sudarsih is an Indonesia-born U.S. citizen who taught Bahasa Indonesia at the University of Michigan, the University of Colorado, and the U.S. government’s Defense Language Institute at Monterey, CA. She is the founder of a Yayasan (non-profit organization) in Solo, Indonesia.
Charles Sullivan, PhD is an international team building consultant and historian who specializes in late colonial and early post-colonial Indonesia. His work is based on deep understanding of ideas of cultural and other forms of diversity. The former coordinator for the University of Michigan’s Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Sullivan’s research focuses on gender, modernity, and national identity in Sukarno era Indonesia. The son of an American Foreign Service family, Charley was three-years-old when he first came to Indonesia. He began studying Javanese dance shortly thereafter and remains a trained dancer and gamelan musician. He speaks fluent Bahasa Indonesia.
The Srikandi Initiative 