Ambassador Kolker was recalled to the State Department in 2021 as senior advisor to the Bureau of Global Health Security and Diplomacy, working part time.
Outside of government, he serves on the boards of MANA Nutrition, the G4 Global Surgery Alliance, Building Tomorrow, American Diplomacy Publications and Firelight Foundation.
He is author of the chapter on "Health and Science Diplomacy" in the textbook "Diplomatic Tradecraft", edited by N, Kralev, published by Cambridge University Press in 2024, In June, 2019, Ambassador Kolker was the commencement speaker at Carleton College, "How To Be Prepared for the Jobs That Don't Yet Exist".
He graduated with a B.A., magna cum laude from Carleton College and received a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship 1970–71, which he spent in Chad, Uganda and Ghana.
Kolker joined the U.S. foreign service in 1977, and held diplomatic reporting posts in Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.
President Bill Clinton nominated Kolker as United States Ambassador to Burkina Faso on July 1, 1999, and he was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in November, 1999.
In November 2011, Kolker returned to the U.S. Government, taking on the role of Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Global Affairs in the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services.