Dear colleagues, partners, and friends,
As you know from our announcement last November, a leadership transition has been underway at the Women’s Refugee Commission. On June 12, I will step down from my role as Executive Director after nearly 16 years of leading this remarkable organization.
Reflecting on these years, I am filled with gratitude. We started small, but with determination, purpose, and a shared vision, we built something strong, meaningful, and enduring.
The extraordinary commitment of our staff and Board in the early years helped shape everything that followed. Over time, we welcomed new colleagues, celebrated progress and important milestones, and navigated moments that tested us and required difficult decisions. Through it all, what has always defined WRC is our people—dedicated, thoughtful, and deeply compassionate individuals committed to this work and to one another.
To all of you—colleagues, partners, and friends—who have been part of WRC’s journey, thank you. This organization exists because of your commitment, your ideas, and your belief in what we can achieve together.
As I step away from my role, I remain deeply committed to supporting a strong transition, ensuring continuity, preserving institutional knowledge, and helping position WRC for continued success.
I am also genuinely excited about what lies ahead. The Board has selected an outstanding successor, who will be announced on June 15, and I am thrilled to see her step into this role. I have great confidence in her leadership and in the values she brings to WRC: collaboration, sustainability, and a deep commitment to our mission.
For me, this is not an ending, but rather the beginning of a new chapter. I will be dedicating more of my time to some of the broader challenges facing our field: helping to reimagine the humanitarian sector with feminist approaches at its center, strengthening transnational organizing for gender equality, and advancing efforts to protect and expand minority rights. I look forward to sharing more about this work in the months ahead.
Serving this organization has been one of the greatest honors of my life. I am proud of how WRC has grown, how it has responded to moments of urgency and transformation, and how it has built lasting partnerships with women’s rights organizations and leaders across the globe.
Working in this field and alongside all of you has made me a better leader. It has challenged me, inspired me, and sustained my hope even in difficult times—a kind of hope that comes from seeing change happen and witnessing resilience firsthand.
We are living through extraordinary and deeply challenging times. Across our communities and around the world, there is uncertainty, fear, and urgent need. The question of what this moment asks of us feels especially important. I believe it calls on us to lead with courage, humility, care, and imagination.
After almost 16 years at WRC, and having lived through a difficult political era in Brazil, I have seen how solidarity can renew our belief that change is possible.
Thank you for everything you have given to this organization, to each other, and to the work we all care so deeply about.
I look forward to staying connected in new ways in the years ahead.
With deep gratitude,
Sarah Costa