Svava Bjarnason

Svava Bjarnason is the Senior Education Specialist at the International Finance Corporation (IFC); the private sector arm of the World Bank Group which focuses on building the capacity of private sector provision in emerging economies. In this capacity, she contributes to all of IFC’s education investments globally and works with private sector providers involved at all levels of education – from primary through to tertiary levels. Svava was co-leader for the development of IFC’s report ‘Education for Employment: realizing Arab youth potential’ and is a member of the implementation team. Prior to joining the IFC in 2007, she was the founding Director of the Observatory on Borderless Higher Education and held a dual post as Director of Research and Strategy at the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU) based in London. Before joining the ACU in 1998, Svava was a consultant in higher education in the United Kingdom. She has served on numerous expert groups for the OECD and UNESCO.