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    Kavita Pullapilly, 39
    Founder & Executive Director
    The Center for International Training, Education, & Development


    Even a brief summary of 39-yearold Kavita Pullapilly’s career to date reveals an amazing record of accomplishment, in the for-profit and non-profit sectors, in the United States and around the world. As her Forty Under 40 award nomination details, Pullapilly from 1994 to 2000 was a senior manager in marketing and managing at General Mills, handling operational budgets exceeding $300 million, and then “worked in the financing and management of international development projects in Eastern Europe, Asia and South America.”

    A former U.S. Peace Corps volunteer, Pullapilly more recently has worked as the Deputy Director for the Peace Corps in the Philippines and Guyana, successfully reshaping both countries’ programs with the help of 600 volunteers and more than 50 staff. In the last 18 months, here in Maine she established her non-profit, The Center for International Training, Education, and Development, “to help continue her social mission of providing educational services and training to people working in multiple capacities in the developmental world as well as in the United States,” explains her nominator, Rachel McAllen.

    McAllen offers an example of Pullapilly’s work: “A rural community in Ukraine had a high number of at-risk, troubled teens – with a rising HIV/AIDS epidemic, drug abuse, and crime. Kavita developed a plan, wrote grants, and raised significant funds to build the Youth Center in Kolomiya. The center became a safe haven for teens ... and thanks to Kavita, a number of Ukrainian teens graduated from school and have since found legal work.”

    Born and raised in South Bend, Indiana, Pullapilly graduated from the University of Notre Dame with a B.B.A. in finance, and holds a master’s degree from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. She is chief operating officer of Sunny Side Up Films, overseeing finance, marketing and distribution. She lives in Old Town.

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