Charles Rutheiser is a senior associate in the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Center for Civic Sites and Community Change, where he manages national grant portfolios on housing and community development, as well as the neighborhood transformation strategy for the Foundation’s work in Baltimore. Previously, Charles directed the graduate program in applied anthropology at Georgia State University and taught cultural anthropology and urban studies at the Johns Hopkins University, Bryn Mawr College and Western Michigan University.

A former Fulbright and Inter-American Foundation Fellow, Charles ‘s publications include two books, Imagineering Atlanta: the politics of place in the city of dreams (1996) and The Opportunity Makers: the first half-century of Sponsors for Educational Opportunity (2016), as well as numerous blogs, articles, book chapters and reports on the roles that systems and networks play in reproducing inequality or advancing social equity in United States and Latin America. He is the founding chairman of the Anchor Institution Funders Group of The Funders Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities and a founding member of Funders for Housing and Opportunity funding collaborative. He also serves on the boards of The Mount Vernon Place Conservancy and The Art of Leadership, a leadership development program for high school students in the Baltimore metro area.

Charles received a MA and PhD in cultural anthropology from the Johns Hopkins University and a BA in anthropology from New College of Florida.