Julius E. Coles

Julius E. Coles (born 1942) is the President of Africare. He has spent over four decades engaged in international development work in Africa or for the benefit of African countries.

Biography

Early life and education

Coles was born in Atlanta, Georgia in 1942. A scholarship to travel abroad piqued his early interest in international issues. He earned a B.A. from Morehouse College (1964) and a Masters of Public Affairs from Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs (1966).

He has also studied at the University of Geneva in Switzerland, the U.S. State Department's Foreign Institute’s Senior Seminar, the Federal Executive Institute and the Institut de Français.

Professional career

Coles served twenty-eight years in the U.S. Foreign Service, most of that time as a senior official with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). He was Mission Director in Swaziland and Senegal and also served in Vietnam, Morocco, Liberia, Nepal and Washington, D.C. He retired from the Foreign Service in 1994 with the rank of Career Minister.

Upon his departure from the foreign service he entered academia. He served as the first Director of Howard University’s Ralph J. Bunche International Affairs Center from 1994 - 1997 and the first Director of Morehouse College’s Andrew Young Center for International Affairs from 1997 - 2002. At both schools, he also taught courses in international relations.

In 2003, Coles accepted the position as the third President of Africare, an organization providing direct assistance in over 25 African nations. In addition to the work of Africare, he continues to write and speak on behalf of increased U.S. involvement in alleviating the problems that continue to plague African societies.

Awards and Associations

Coles received numerous awards including the Distinguished Career Service Award (1995), the Presidential Meritorious Service Award (1983-1986), and was decorated by President Abdou Diouf of Senegal as Commander in the Order of Lion (1994).

He is a member of the boards of The Mountain Institute, InterAction, L’Alliance Française de Washington, DC, Andrew Young Center for International Affairs at Morehouse College and Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School. In addition, he was elected as a member of the Sigma Pi Phi fraternity, Rotary Club of Atlanta, Council on Foreign Relations, the Bretton Woods Committee and has been appointed as a member of the UNESCO International Commission on the Gorée Memorial.

References

* [http://www.africare.org/news/news_release/africarepresident.html Africare Welcomes As Its New President, Julius E. Coles]
* Coles, Julius E. Monday, August 8, 2005. " [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/07/AR2005080700887.html Bush's Role in Africa] ". Washington Post, Page A15.