Nili Sarit Yossinger

Nili Sarit Yossinger
Executive Director

Nili Sarit Yossinger is the inaugural Executive Director for Refugee Congress, overseeing operations, and implementing communications, funding, capacity-building, advocacy, and partnerships strategies that fulfill the organization’s mission of ensuring that there are always refugees at the table as equal partners.

Prior to her work with Refugee Congress, Nili was a Research Project Manager at the Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM) and the Senior Vice President’s Office for Research at Georgetown University, where her multi stakeholder projects included complex humanitarian emergencies; the intersections of forced migration, food security and environmental degradation in the Horn of Africa and Persian Gulf regions; and the use of open source data in predicting food supply chain shocks.

 Most recently, Nili co-authored Integration Outcomes for Forcibly Displaced Persons (FDPs) A Holistic Co-Design Approach, a report from Refugee Congress, Refugee Council USA, and ECDC, that evaluates and proposes improved metrics for measuring integration, from the perspectives of forcibly displaced people.

Nili previously worked with the Capital Area Food Bank, the UN Refugee Agency in Washington, D.C., and Human Rights First. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in International Studies from Loyola University Chicago and a Master of Arts in German and European Studies from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, along with a Certificate in Refugees and Humanitarian Emergencies from ISIM. She currently serves as an Advisor for Concordia, an organization that builds and sustains cross-sector partnerships for social impact, and is a longtime volunteer on the senior staff of American Model United Nations.

“As the granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, I believe advocacy is at its strongest when individuals who once sought refuge lead the conversations that create welcoming communities. It is an honor and a privilege to work alongside Refugee Congress advocates who are changing the way we think of advocacy.”