Julia Pettengill is the Executive Director of the Schooner Foundation, where she provides strategic leadership for the Foundation’s global grantmaking and institutional operations. She oversees a portfolio of more than eighty partnerships advancing human rights, social justice, global health equity, mental health, community-led development, education, livelihoods, and environmental resilience. Julia leads the creation and management of new philanthropic funds and initiatives, including the Foundation’s crisis response fund, global mental health portfolio, and community health systems strengthening efforts. She also stewards the core portfolio, supports partners with both financial and non-financial resources, and leverages Schooner funding to catalyze collaboration and long-term impact.
She serves on the boards of Friendship Bench, Zimele, and Fathers’ UpLift, co-chairs the Advisory Council of UCSF’s HEAL Initiative, and is a member of the Harvard Medical School Global Health and Service Delivery Advisory Council. Julia also collaborates with academic and policy partners at the Carr Ryan Center for Human Rights at the Harvard Kennedy School, Brigham and Women’s Global Health Equity Residency, and Boston University Center for Forced Displacement.
Previously, she served on the National Cancer Institute’s Pediatric Leukemia and Lymphoma Steering Committee and co-chaired the Dana Farber Cancer Institute’s Pediatric Patient and Family Advisory Council. She holds a Bachelor of Arts and a Master of Education from the University of Cape Town.
