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Alan Van Egmond’s career spans 37 years of leadership roles in non-governmental organizations (NGOs), Congress and U.S. government agencies in many parts of the world. On the NCWA Board of Directors, he chairs the Southwest Florida Model UN program at Florida Gulf Coast University each March and has expanded its impact to many area schools that are developing their own competitions.

After graduate school, he worked with an NGO in Africa and later for the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Africa, eventually becoming staff director of the Subcommittee on Human Rights and International Organizations. He then joined the U.S. Foreign Service and achieved increasingly senior positions with the U.S. Agency for International Development, State Department and Office of the Secretary of Defense. During those years he worked on policy development for Africa, Asia, the Balkans, Russia, the Near East, and Latin America. 

At the Department of Defense, he was senior advisor for the Middle East and director for Iraq in the Office of the Secretary. From 2009-2013, he oversaw U.S. civilian-military cooperation in Afghanistan and Pakistan for USAID. 

He holds a B.A. from Wesleyan University and M.A. and M.A.L.D degrees from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. 

A resident of Bonita Springs since 2018, Alan is a member of the boards of the Center for Critical Thinking and the U.S. Foreign Service Retirees Association of Florida. Currently he is co-teaching an advanced course on diplomacy at Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU). With NCWA, he has been an active discussant and presenter for Great Decisions.  In addition to chairing the Model UN program, he has been a Model UN keynote speaker, fundraiser, judge, and high school team mentor.