Leading with Purpose

Swetha Ramachandran
MA ‘18
Conflict Management

Swetha applied to Johns Hopkins SAIS because she was looking to attend a top international relations program with a strong Conflict Management program focusing both on qualitative and quantitative skills. Furthermore, she was enticed by the flexibility that the school provided in designing one’s curriculum while simultaneously exploring internship and research opportunities.

Before her graduate studies, Swetha interned with Indian reformer and politician, Jayaprakash Narayan. She received a grant by the UK-India Education and Research Initiative to spend the summer of 2015 as an exchange student in the UK. Swetha’s previous degrees are in Economics, Political Science and Psychology.

Swetha is actively involved in the community on and off-campus. During her first year she worked in the Office of the Dean and interned at the Embassy of Jordan, in addition to winning the annual Johns Hopkins SAIS-Georgetown Policy Debate. Currently, she serves as a consultant for UN Women through the SAIS Women Lead Practicum and as a Research Assistant at the US Institute of Peace (USIP). She also serves as president of the Global Women in Leadership (GWL) student organization and is a board member of the SAIS Diversity Coalition.

In SAIS Women Lead, Swetha was delighted to find an academic component at the school focusing on advocacy and empowerment of women. Her favorite experience with this initiative has been the workshops that were conducted as a part of her practicum. These workshops covered critical skills like Negotiation, Project Management, Social Impact Strategy, and Public Presentation. She found the workshops engaging and immensely useful to refine her research project with UN Women and Equal Means Equal.

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