Founding DirectorThe Gem Foundation
Karen Mercaldo is founding director of the Gem Foundation, supporting community- and dignity-driven development around the world. Gem’s primary investments are through Tostan, where she serves on a Leadership Advisory Council for their community empowerment program in West Africa, and through Global Communities/PCI, where she and her co-investors launched and advise their women empowerment program, organizing and supporting savings groups in 15 countries.
As an operating foundation, Gem also works In the US to convene and connect people across multiple boundaries. In 2015, Gem initiated “humankind”, a network of initiatives to build the capacity of people in the San Diego/Tijuana region to have meaningful, if difficult, conversations, in response to a global series of conferences, in partnership with the Women Peacemakers’ Program and USD, on countering extremism. She is a member of the Global Philanthropy Forum and San Diego Grantmakers.
Karen’s past professional lives include international banker at Chase Manhattan, strategic planner and consultant at McKinsey & Company, breakthrough change facilitator at Robert Schaffer & Associates and leadership developer at the University of British Columbia. She moved to San Diego from Vancouver (where she initiated the merger of the Canadian Outward Bound schools) in 1999 and is energized by its potential as a diverse, dynamic bi-national region. A graduate of Middlebury College, Karen has lived and traveled extensively internationally and is a citizen of the U.S. and of Canada. She and her late husband, Ed, are proud parents of two young adults who are making the world a better place.