A career member of the U.S. Senior Executive Service, Gloria D. Steele assumed the duties as the USAID Mission Director for the Philippines and the Pacific Islands.
 
Prior to her appointment in the Philippines, Ms. Steele served as the Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator for the Bureau for Global Health, U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). She assumed this position in January 2005, and was responsible for overseeing an average annual health program budget of $1.5-billion, and a staff of 240.
 
Ms. Steele served as Senior Deputy Assistant Administrator for the Bureau for Europe and Eurasia from 2001-2004. Other USAID assignments include seven years of work in the Bureau for Africa as an Agricultural Economist, and seven years in the Bureau for Science and Technology overseeing applied research on key rural development issues such as land tenure, access to agricultural credit, food security, and natural resource management.
 
Ms. Steele also served for one year in the Bureau for Policy and Program Coordination, where she led the development of a food security policy paper.
 
From 1974-1980, Ms. Steele served as a management consultant to the Philippines' Secretary of Agriculture. She taught business economics at Letran Graduate School for Business in Manila, Philippines in 1979.
 
She received a Master of Science in agricultural economics from Kansas State University in 1978. She also has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Business Administration from Maryknoll College in the Philippines.
 
Ms. Steele was the recipient of a Presidential Meritorious Executive Award in 2007, and a Presidential Distinguished Executive Award in 2008.