Who I am and how I got here
I was born in Oakland, California…
and grew up in Berkeley (xučyun, unceded Ohlone land). I feel deeply shaped by my home. The Bay Area’s breathtaking natural beauty and progressive multiculturalism help me envision a vibrant and sustainable future. Meanwhile, its distressing wealth inequality, rampant houselessness, and increasing vulnerability to climate-induced disasters elucidate the challenges ahead.
The years between
I spent four idyllic years at Williams College, where I studied computer science and physics — and equally importantly, sang a capella with the Ephlats and played frisbee with WUFO. After graduation, I left for England, where I completed an MPhil in Advanced Computer Science at the University of Cambridge. A sweet little identity crisis ensued: I realized I was more interested in applying computation to address societal challenges (notably the climate crisis and deepening inequities) than I was in improving the field of computation per se (though I did fall in love with the field of algorithmic bias and fairness, and probably would be ultra-employable if I’d stuck with it). I was fortunate enough to be accepted to Cambridge’s MPhil in Environmental Policy, where I learned a ton (including how much I had yet to learn) and met an incredible community of course mates and collaborators. After two years in Cambridge, I followed my community and the magnetism of the big city and moved to London, where I spent two years working remotely for the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.
My PhD at UC Berkeley
I was thrilled to return home for my PhD in Energy and Resources at UC Berkeley, where I’m advised by Profs Duncan Callaway and Dan Kammen. During my PhD, I’ve been a Graduate Student Researcher at UC Berkeley Law’s Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment and Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory’s Energy Technologies Area. I spent a sweltering summer visiting the University of Chicago’s Institute for Mathematical and Statistical Innovation, a summer close to home learning about the give and take of life outside academia (!) at Evolved Energy Research, and another scorcher (but I’ll take the Alps over air conditioning any day) at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Austria. I’ve also done contract work at two drastically different scales: municipality-level equitable EV charger siting work with the County of Napa and global climate policy complementarity modeling with the World Bank. These days I get to spend my time thinking about how ideas from complex systems and evolutionary economics can make climate policy work better — in the creekside shade of some pretty incredible redwoods.