Mrs. Gretchen Gerwe Welch (ALU ’02)

Diplomat (Retired)
United States

Mrs. Gretchen Gerwe Welch is a retired diplomat who is active in volunteer and philanthropic pursuits. Her thirty-two-year career in the US Foreign Service included assignments in Pakistan, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Kingdom, as well as numerous senior positions in Washington.  

Since retirement, Gretchen has been involved in arts, education and non-profit work. In addition to the AUC board, she serves on the boards of the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Asian Art (NMAA); the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford; the Senior Living Foundation of the Foreign Service; and Alfanar, a venture philanthropy organization active in the Arab world. She is a docent at the NMAA and conducts museum tours both in person and virtually for student groups and adults.

Gretchen graduated from Stanford University in 1978 with a degree in international relations and received a postgraduate diploma in Asian Art in 2016 from SOAS at the University of London. She studied at AUC’s Arabic Language Institute in 2001-2002.