Patty Curran

Executive Director

Patty has spent her career focused on leading social justice and business ethics efforts. After studying Social Work at St. Mary’s College, Notre Dame, she worked with coal mining communities in Appalachia and then in inner-city Washington, D.C. before serving as a Jesuit Volunteer in Kathmandu. She spent the following 15 years in Cambodia contributing to the fight against landmines and providing vocational training to landmine survivors, and through various non-profits, she led efforts to fundraise, support organizational development, and build skills and confidence of community groups driving change in their communities.

Ten years ago, she moved to Myanmar where she facilitated the collaborative effort of drafting of the National Strategic Plan for the Advancement of Women 2011-2021. She served as Trócaire’s Country Representative, leading a large team tasked with fostering partnerships with local organizations advancing women in leadership, demanding land rights, and providing humanitarian assistance to tens of thousands of Kachin people displaced by civil war.

With a move to the private sector, as Telenor Myanmar’s SVP and Head of Sustainability, Patty led teams in community outreach, supply chain sustainability, and social responsibility. Before leaving Telenor, she started a large-scale effort to provide a digital education program to out-of-school children in rural Myanmar through the free monastic education system. Most recently Patty was PeaceNexus Foundation’s Regional Programme Manager, supporting community groups to develop effective advocacy strategies and promoting conflict sensitivity within the private sector.

The middle of eleven children, Patty grew up in a family where social justice was instilled in them. Patty and her husband, Mark, have three children, Augustine, Dorothy, and Salvador.