Julie Saito is a Chief and in charge of the International Coordination Team of the UNESCO Associated Schools Network (ASPnet) in the Division of Education for Peace and Sustainable Development at UNESCO's Headquarters in Paris.
She joined UNESCO in 2007 as attaché de Press for the Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura and worked as programme specialist of Education for Sustainable Development to mobilize and empower youth leaders from 2012 until the current post.
Ms. Saito initiated the UNESCO Kizuna Campaign in 2011 in collaboration with ASPnet to collect more than 20,000 message cards from the school children of over 60 countries, which were delivered to encourage the children affected by the Tsunami in Japan.
After giving up dream to become a choreographer and pianist in her 20s, she received her M.S. in Journalism from the Columbia School of Journalism in New York, USA to start her 20-year journalistic career as Television coordinator for Nippon Television in New York and NBC News in Tokyo, which brought her an Emmy Award in 1986 as Associate Producer of KNBC's production "Ring of Fire," a series of stories on earthquake preparedness in Japan.
She also worked for Japanese daily, Asahi Shimbun, as staff writer for 16 years. Ms. Saito was born in Tokyo and has lived many years abroad: Bangkok, Nairobi, New York, Lyon (France), and currently in Paris. She is a mother of three grown-up children and her hobby remains playing the piano.