Blavatnik Internship Program
The Blavatnik Internship Program at CFR was established through a generous gift from the Blavatnik Family Foundation. The program provides paid internships to more than one hundred interns each year. Blavatnik interns gain new insights into critical foreign policy issues and interact directly with leading experts and practitioners. They are offered professional development training to complement their substantive work with a series of skill-based workshops, trainings, and career advice sessions as a foundation for future work in the field of foreign policy and international affairs, and beyond. By providing a competitive hourly wage to all interns, the goal of the program is to make the Council’s highly competitive internships accessible to a broader range of qualified students from all backgrounds, making way for new talent and increasingly diverse perspectives in the field of international relations.
Len Blavatnik
CFR Member Len Blavatnik is among the world’s most accomplished businessmen and prominent philanthropists. For over 35 years, he has invested in businesses to unlock their potential and transform them into international market leaders, while also advancing science, higher education, and culture through charitable giving.
A dual US-UK citizen, Len is the founder of Access Industries, a privately held company headquartered in New York with investments across a range of sectors, including strategic equity, global media and entertainment, real estate, and biotechnology. To date, Access Industries has built a global portfolio of over $35 billion.
The Blavatnik Family Foundation is exclusively self-funded and has contributed more than $1.5 billion to 250 institutions worldwide over the past decade, fostering scientific innovation, world-class culture, and preparing future leaders. The Foundation prioritizes higher education as well as scientific and medical research and innovation. Its activities are highly concentrated to drive meaningful impact and to promote discoveries at major research institutions that will benefit the whole of society. To that end, the Foundation has made transformational gifts to Harvard, Yale, and Tel Aviv Universities, and established the Blavatnik School of Government at Oxford University. In 2017, Len was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for his service to philanthropy and was appointed Chevalier of the French Legion d’Honneur for his support of education in 2013.
Born in Odesa, Ukraine, Len and his family emigrated to the United States in 1978. He earned his Master’s in Computer Science from Columbia University in 1981 and his MBA from Harvard Business School in 1989.
Len is married to Emily Appelson Blavatnik, and they have four children together.