George Zeno

Biography

I am a social science engineer who co-designs equity and justice system change initiatives for a collective social impact. I’ve spent 27 years in the field of education and global health, leading student ecosystem development at the University of Washington and UC Berkeley, and chief global philanthropy officer at PATH. I’ve led teams that have bundled nearly half a billion US dollars in resources over those years.

I’m currently the Associate Vice President for Advancement at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Washington, USA where we are leading the development of a collective impact model for higher education that disrupts the traditional capital campaign structure where wealth extracted community resources are held by a single institution (university) with little input from community while being fully controlled by a handful of elite decision makers and wealthy funders.

We are committed to disrupting power structures, racism, and systemic inequities in philanthropy by focusing on economic development of economic pyramid base, sharing power, centering the community’s voice, co-designing culturally appropriate and responsive approaches to solutions with those living closest to the challenges, and collaborating for system building based on leveraged strengths of collective intelligence and resources.