Annie Paulson 

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

Annie Paulson works at the intersections of divergent disciplines. Her Master’s degree from the Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy at Tufts University included graduate level studies in international development, conflict resolution, human security, peacebuilding, and nonprofit management.  Annie also holds a bachelor’s degree from Brown University, where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa, magna cum laude, with honors in Anthropology. Her master’s thesis research investigated how the arts can contribute to the resilience of refugees, while her undergraduate thesis research explored varying cultural representations of gender identity in indigenous populations in North America.  Annie’s ongoing research interests have included human rights, gender, and cultural diplomacy.  

Paulson works as a consultant, researcher, lecturer, and musician. She served as the Chair of the Young Professional Advisory Board for The International Institute of Rural Reconstruction (IIRR) for three years and has volunteered as an international dialogue facilitator for the nonprofit Soliya, engaging university students in the Middle East and elsewhere in the world in productive conversations to stimulate connections and mutual understanding. She has also designed and co-taught a course entitled “Music for Social Change” at the Osher Institute at Tufts University in Boston. Previously, she worked with the World Bank’s Advisory on Disability and Development, attending international conferences and visiting World Bank projects, traveling extensively in rural areas in Ethiopia, Uganda, South Africa, India, Pakistan, Thailand, Japan, and Brazil. She also served with the nonprofit WorldTeach in Ecuador, living and teaching in the Galapagos Islands. Annie has also been a cellist for many decades and studied performance and chamber music at the music conservatory in Bologna Italy, and currently performs with the Greenwich Village Orchestra in New York.

Currently, Annie has been appointed as the Executive Director of LOWO, where she seeks to create a sustainable path through nonprofit partnerships to promote the innovative LOWO methodology, which focuses on facilitated community dialogue as a means for local communities to achieve their own development goals with grassroots involvement. She also works on other projects and consultancies in the nonprofit sphere, as well as real estate projects in New York.