Gayatri Datar

Gayatri was born in Pittsburgh, PA, and grew up in Stanford, CA, and Weston, MA.  She is currently working at the Independent Evaluation Group of the World Bank, where she conducts impact evaluations to assess the effectiveness of various World Bank projects in alleviating poverty through quantative and qualitative methods.

She graduated from Harvard College in January 2009 with a degree in Economics, after having taken three semesters off to pursue various interests in international development.  She first deferred the Spring Semester of 2005 to travel to India and do Tsunami relief work in Cuddalore, a devastated district of Tamil Nadu (a state in India). She worked with a local NGO named BLESS, where she helped conduct need assesments, wrote funding proposals, assisted the staff in developing projects, documented the progress of the villages, and worked and collaborated with various international aid agencies.  Gayatri has also worked in Namibia with the Namibia Women’s Network, a rural women’s development NGO, and the Namibian Educational Technology Alliance, an NGO that worked to integrate information and communication technologies into the Namibian curriculum.  She spent 2 months in Nicaragua doing thesis research with a local microfinance institution, and eventually wrote her thesis on the price elasticity of demand for microcredit.  Finally, she spent four months in Albania studying issues of governance and corruption, and volunteering with a civil society NGO to work on a class action lawsuit.  She has also worked in nonprofit consulting with the Boston Consulting Group and New Sector Alliance.

At Harvard, she focused on development economics, and wrote her thesis on the price elasticity of demand for microcredit.  Extracurricularly, she directed and founded a program under the Phillips Brooks House Association (PBHA) called the Harvard College Youth Leadership Initiative (HYLI).  HYLI strives to empower youth by teaching them leadership skills through interactive activities and hands-on experience.  Gayatri also coordinated and led 160 students on several Katrina relief service trips to the Gulf Coast under PBHA during three Harvard vacation, and served as Chair of the South Asian Women’s Collective, initiating an annual charity auction that raised $10,000.  

In her free time, Gayatri enjoys running, classical Indian dance, playing tennis, and watching the Red Sox.