Alfonsina Peñaloza

Alfonsina, who leads our Latin America and global grantmaking, brings more than twenty years of experience in gender, development and public policy.

Prior to joining Co-Impact, Alfonsina was a Program Officer at the Hewlett Foundation, where for nearly a decade she was responsible for grants in Women’s Economic Empowerment and Transparency, Participation and Accountability. This included the creation and implementation of grant-making strategies and organizational strengthening in Mexico, Sub Saharan Africa and globally. Alfonsina helped create the Women’s Funds Collaborative, a $25 million time-bound initiative to support and strengthen the ecosystem of women’s funds in the Global South.

From 2007 to 2012 Alfonsina helped create Ethos, a public policy think tank in Mexico where she served as deputy director and led projects related to gender equality, competitiveness, food security, and strengthening civil society and citizen participation.

Alfonsina has worked in the Ministry of Public Administration in Mexico, where she monitored international anti-corruption conventions and helped integrate gender perspectives in the Federal Public Administration. And as deputy director she helped establish the Mexican Council of International Affairs, the only Mexican think tank in the field of foreign policy, where she created a youth program.

She has a bachelor’s degree in international relations from the Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México in Mexico City, and a master’s degree in gender, development and globalization from the London School of Economics. She is a feminist, a melomaniac and inherited her love for travel from her American grandmother. Mexican at heart, Alfonsina was born and raised in Mexico City, has American and Uruguayan blood, and has lived in London and San Francisco.