Ellen Brooks Shehata is the Investment Lead for the Innovative Finance Practice at IRC’s Airbel Impact Lab, building a portfolio of projects to realign capital behind humanitarian objectives. She has over a decade of expertise working in the Middle East in finance, investment advisory, fundraising, and policy and served as a Vice President in JPMorgan’s Private Banking division from 2014-2019. Prior to that, she was living in Cairo, Egypt, working at the American Chamber of Commerce in Egypt on economic and investment policy. Ellen holds a B.A. in Art History from the University of California, Los Angeles; and a master’s degree from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs in international finance and middle eastern studies. She is also on the Board of ArteEast.

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