Maria Paula Rojas is the grantmaking learning officer in the Office of Strategy and Learning. In her role, she facilitates cross-programmatic and cross-regional learning, connecting program staff on key issues and trends that affect their work in order to promote deeper reflection on how social change happens. Some particular areas of focus are narrative, polarization, just energy transition, and centering gender.
From 2017-2022, Maria was a program associate for the Andean Region Office in Bogota, where she supported the team to develop and advance regional strategy through monitoring, evaluation, and learning activities. She also conducted research on specific topics such as polarization, collective territorial rights, and illegal mining. She helped to oversee work in Venezuela and represented the Andean office in the Disability Learning Group.
Before joining Ford in 2017, Maria Paula worked as a graduate research assistant for the Armed Conflict and Peace-building Research Program (ConPaz) at Universidad de los Andes in Colombia. In 2016, Maria Paula did a research internship with the Latin America and Caribbean program at the Carter Center in Atlanta. From 2014 to 2015, she participated in research projects funded by the Colombian National Ministry of Education to assess the impact of school-based educational programs on the academic performance of primary school-age children.
Maria Paula holds an MA in Peacebuilding, a BA in Economics, and a BA in Political Science from the Universidad de los Andes in Colombia.