Deborah L. (Debbie) Trent is an independent consultant and analyst in public diplomacy and international development. Clients include the Global Humanities Institute at Montgomery College, Maryland and other academic institutions and educational organizations. Current research focuses on designing, monitoring and evaluating public-private partnerships and other programs that support cross-cultural understanding and international enterprises.

Contributing two chapters, Debbie was managing editor of Nontraditional U.S. Public Diplomacy: Past, Present, and Future, the most recent publication of the Public Diplomacy Council in the United States. She is secretary of the council’s board. Debbie has taught public diplomacy at the graduate level and managed college and university partnerships and Fulbright programs at the former U.S. Information Agency for 13 years, after a Presidential Management Internship.

While completing a Ph.D. in public policy and public administration, Debbie held fellowships at George Washington University and the Arab American Institute and coordinated human resource management research for a GW-Bearing Point partnership. Prior, she co-founded a nonprofit international education and training firm, serving community colleges as well as universities.

Active in local-to-global civil society, Debbie chairs the American Society for Public Administration Section on Effective and Sound Administration in the Middle East and the Montgomery County, Maryland Middle Eastern American Advisory Group.

Debbie's CPD Research Fellowship Project is titled, "Gauging the Quality of Public-Private Partnership Programs Involving U.S.-Based Diasporas."