Alumni Profiles
Jesse Atkinson
MPIA '08
Jesse Atkinson manages behavioral finance research as a subcontractor on USAID’s BASIS grant. He is currently finalizing a paper with IR/PS Professor Craig McIntosh and Betty Sadoulet at UC Berkeley based on field experiments he managed in Guatemala. The randomized controlled trials tested whether a new savings account with a commitment and reminders could increase savings among microfinance clients. He was responsible for project implementation, managing partner relationships, and the ongoing analysis of experimental results.
At IR/PS, Jesse was the managing director of Export Access. In that capacity he helped to institutionalize the annual meeting of stakeholders and double the number of student experiences. He also managed and presented the "2008 Economic Impact of the Military on San Diego" report before San Diego's policy community.
Jesse is temporaroily in San Diego finishing the USAID project, developing GIS skills, and studying for the CFA exam in preparation for his next overseas project.
