Dr. Karenbeth Zacharias is the Chair of the Division of Humanities and Liberal Arts and Director of the Lawrence D. Starr Center for Peace & Justice at the University of Saint Mary. Her passion for human rights began when she lived in Turkey as an American Field Service student after high-school graduation. Expanding her understanding of international laws around protections of vulnerable populations, Karenbeth teaches courses on the History of Genocide, Women in World History, and Modern Africa. Karenbeth has a J.D. from the University of Kansas School of Law and a Ph.D. in History from KU. She is the Vice President of the United Nations Association of Greater Kansas City.
For Karenbeth, the IRC matters because civic engagement and education at the local level help us better understand the world and its complex political, social, and cultural ecosystems at the global level.