Diana Benton Schechter serves as Interim Chief Executive Officer at the END Fund, a collaborative philanthropic fund dedicated to controlling and eliminating neglected tropical diseases (NTDs)- including intestinal worms, river blindness, trachoma, schistosomiasis, lymphatic filariasis and visceral leishmaniasis. These preventable and treatable diseases threaten the health, opportunity and dignity of more than 1.6 billion people globally. Through resource mobilization, programmatic grantmaking, storytelling, advocacy and convening, the END Fund’s global community — philanthropic investors, program partners, Board members and staff — supports more than 30 countries to end NTDs, with a primary emphasis in Africa.
Before joining the END Fund in 2017 as Vice President, Strategy & Operations, and more recently Chief Operating Officer, Diana led strategic planning at The Atlantic Philanthropies, the limited life foundation founded by Charles F. Feeney. Between 1982 and 2016, Atlantic committed more than $9 billion to social change around the world. Diana played a central role in grantmaking planning, facilitated strategic decision-making, and managed workflow across the foundation’s seven offices on five continents. Prior to joining Atlantic in 2007, Diana was a consultant at Robinson Lerer & Montgomery (now FGS Global), a strategic communications and crisis management firm based in New York.
Diana has served on the boards of One World Surgery; Discovery to Cure, an institute at Yale University committed to advancing the prevention, early detection and treatment of women’s reproductive cancers; and the Columbia College Young Alumni Fund. She is a member of the Columbia College Young Leaders Council and a longtime fundraiser for the American Cancer Society.
She earned a BA from Columbia University and an MPA from New York University.
Diana lives in New York City with her husband and two daughters.