Rebecca Russo

Vice President of Higher Education Strategy 

Rebecca oversees IA’s work in higher education, partnering with colleges and universities to become laboratories where students can deepen and challenge their own worldviews and learn to build relationships across divides. She has worked at Interfaith America for nearly a decade and held previous roles as the Director of Engagement at Northwestern University’s Fiedler Hillel and Executive Director of the Campus Climate Initiative at Hillel International. Rebecca has written on the importance of bridge-building in higher education in the Journal of College and Character, Religion News Service, and Times Higher Education. Rebecca holds a B.A. in Middle East Studies from Brown University and an MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. Rebecca is inspired by her interfaith experiences living in Morocco and Jerusalem, and by the Talmudic concept of “these and those are words of the living God,” to work toward a society where religious diversity is engaged actively and positively. Rebecca lives in Chicago with her family and enjoys singing, hiking, and chasing around her three children.