Emiliana Vegas

Since September 2012, Emiliana Vegas is the Chief of the Education Division at the InterAmerican Development Bank in Washington, DC. In this capacity, she leads a team of 30-40 professionals working in the Bank’s lending operations and analytical activities to support education systems throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. Between September 2001 and August 2012, Ms. Vegas worked at The World Bank in Washington, DC, where she held various positions in the Human Development Network, her latest being Lead Economist and Human Development Sector Leader for Central America, and Lead Economist in the Education Unit of the Human Development Department. She has managed lending operations and applied research on regional and global education policy issues, including early childhood development, teacher policies and school finance systems and is the author of several articles in peer-reviewed journals and institutional reports. Her books include The Promise of Early Childhood Development in Latin America and the Caribbean (2010, The World Bank Press, co-authored with Lucrecia Santibáñez), Raising Student Learning in Latin America: The Challenge for the 21st Century (2007, The World Bank Press, coauthored with Jenny Petrow) and Incentives to Improve Teaching: Lessons from Latin America (2005, The World Bank Press, Editor). Ms. Vegas has a doctorate in education from Harvard University with a concentration in economics of education, a master’s degree in public policy studies from Duke University, and a bachelor’s degree in communications with a concentration in journalism from Andrés Bello Catholic University in Caracas, Venezuela.