Zainab M. Hassan is a poet, and human rights, gender equity, and social and
environmental justice activist. She is the Founder & Chairwoman of Somali Gender Equity
Movement (SGEM), a global movement that advocates for and promotes women’s social
and economic justice, and political equity in the public decision making arena. She also
works as a consultant and researcher for international and local organizations, and
government agencies. Currently, she is a member of a team developing a National
Reconciliation Framework for the Ministry of Interior, Federal Affairs & Reconciliation.
Previously, she was an Advisor to the Office of the President, and served the Technical
Support Team for the National Consultative Forum for the 2016-2017 Indirect Election.
Zainab served the Steering Committee of HOPE – Horn of Africa Peace Engagement, a
group promoting peace, integration and economic prosperity in the region. From 2007-
2012, Zainab was a Program Officer for The Minneapolis Foundation (TMF), the oldest
existing community foundation in the United States, and led the Foundation’s strategic
focus areas of Transform Education, and Capital grants of the community grantmaking.
She served as a key staff and managed special purpose funds, and represented the
Foundation’s interests to public and private agencies, donors, funding partners, grantees,
grantseekers, and communities. Zainab was also the chairwomen of Pan Somali Council
for peace and Democracy known as Israaca (the largest organization for Somali
intellectuals in the Diaspora at the time). Zainab has more than twenty years of
professional work experience in public, private, nonprofit, academic, and philanthropic
sectors.
Academically, Zainab holds a Masters of Public Affairs (MPA) from the Hubert H.
Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, University of Minnesota, and was awarded the Best
Individual Masters of Public Affairs Paper for the 2006 graduating class. She also
graduated with honors from Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia earning a B.S. in
Environmental Health with a minor in Chemistry. Zainab also participated in the James P.
Shannon Leadership Institute program, and was the recipient of several fellowships,
notably The Funders’ Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities’ PLACES
Fellowship; the Upper Midwest Human Rights Fellowship; and the Otto Bremer
Foundation’s Graduate Fellowship on Philanthropy and Human Rights.
