Leonard Benardo directs fellowship support to journalists, advocates, academics, and others working on innovative approaches to traditional open society challenges. He also oversees all Open Society grantmaking in Russia and is the Foundations’ principal liaison to the Central European University.
Benardo has worked at the Open Society Foundations since 1996, starting in the Moscow office. As a regional director, he oversaw the Foundations’ activities in Russia, Ukraine, the Baltics, Poland, and Hungary.
He taught history and Spanish in a New York City public high school. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, New York Review of Books, and International Herald Tribune, and he is the coauthor of Brooklyn by Name: How the Neighborhoods, Streets, Parks, Bridges, and More Got Their Names and Citizen-in-Chief: The Second Lives of the American Presidents.