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Contributor Guidelines

Submitting guest blogs is open to Global Washington’s members of the Atlas level and above. We value a diversity of opinions on a broad range of subjects of interest to the global health and development community.

Blog article submissions should be 500-1500 words. Photos, graphs, videos, and other art that supports the main themes are strongly encouraged.

You may not be the best writer, and that’s okay. We can help you shape and edit your contribution. The most important thing is that it furthers an important conversation in your field, and that it is relatively jargon-free. Anyone without a background in global development should still be able to engage with your ideas.

If you include statistics or reference current research, please hyperlink your sources in the text, wherever possible.

Have an idea of what you’d like to write about? Let’s continue the conversation! Email comms@globalWA.org and put “Blog Idea” in the subject line.


Voices from the Field: Khalil Sleiman of World Vision

Khali SleimanOn Tuesday, May 2nd Global Washington hosted a small discussion as part of its newly launched “Voices from the Field” event series. Khalil Sleiman, a member of World Vision’s Global Rapid Response Team, presented on the current humanitarian crisis in the Middle East.

Khalil brought to the discussion his in-depth knowledge, as well as his own experience of war and displacement. Originally from a small village in southern Lebanon, Khalil’s family lost their home and land during the Lebanese Civil War. Continue Reading

Jumping Beans? Thoughts on Coffee & Resilience

by Erika Koss

Coffee cherries in Rwanda

Coffee cherries in Rwanda (Photo: Erika Koss)

At last week’s Global Specialty Coffee Expo in Seattle, the word “resilience” bounced around like an India rubber ball.

World Coffee Research shared its focus on breeding resilient seeds that will result in resilient beans—or, coffee trees that can withstand the earth’s rising temperatures, which threaten coffee yields.

Computational chemist Dr. Christopher Hendon, in his talk on Water & Cryogenics, illustrated why coffee beans possess resilience to freezing. Dr. Andre Sanfiorenzo, an expert in landscape genetics, explained why sun grown coffee lacks resilience in the agroforestry systems.

But if a coffee bean’s resilience is all the buzz, why does this matter for coffee farmer producers? Continue Reading

The Ripple Effect: Clean Water Programs that Promote Long-Term Behavior Change

Ripple effect panel

By Meaghan Bogart

Today, 2.5 billion people worldwide do not have access to clean water and a simple toilet. Despite international attention and action around this issue, 35-50% of water projects fail within the first 5 years. In order to share a greater understanding around world water inequalities and the complexity in developing sustainable change, Global Washington hosted a panel event highlighting three organizations that are on the front lines.

Continue Reading