Kara Watkins is the Senior Program Manager for the Inclusive Saving and Investing Initiative at the Aspen Institute Financial Security Program. Kara leads a portfolio of programming centered around early asset building, emergency savings, and retirement security designed to identify, convene, support, and foster a community of cross-sector leaders as they seek to create a truly inclusive, lifelong savings and wealth-building system in the United States, especially for economically vulnerable households.
Prior to joining Aspen, Kara spent over three years building the Bipartisan Policy Center’s Funding Our Future initiative as the Senior Coalition Manager. Kara scaled the coalition membership of cross-sector partners and executed opportunities to highlight barriers and opportunities around retirement security for the public and policymakers.
Kara served as the Director of National Programs for the Friends of the National Museum of the American Latino campaign at The Raben Group, where she also managed a portfolio of issue-advocacy initiatives on behalf of nonprofit, foundation, and corporate clients. Kara started her career on Capitol Hill and has roots in local campaign organizing.
Kara earned her B.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a double major in Political Science and Latin American Studies with a certificate in Spanish.
