RISE 2019 Conference

Transforming University Engagement In Pre- and Post-Disaster Environments: Lessons from Puerto Rico

Glorynel Ojeda

Graduate Student, School of Sustainability

Arizona State University

 

havidan rodriguez photo

Glorynel is a Ph.D. student in the School of Sustainability at Arizona State University, where she also serves as a Teaching Associate of Sustainable Cities and Sustainable Urban Dynamics. She holds an interdisciplinary vision, thanks to her academic background in Civil Engineering, Urban and Territorial Planning, and Environmental Sciences. Glorynel’s research interests focus on socio-eco-technical systems, sustainability transitions, green infrastructure, and behavioral change and collaborations to drive sustainable strategies. She is committed to the effective transfer of scientific knowledge outside the academic environment to support informed decision making. She has over ten years of professional experience, including in local and state government, private firms, and nonprofit organizations. She has participated in numerous initiatives to advance sustainability, including first Puerto Rico’s Sustainable Agritourism Guide and the first estimate of the Puerto Rican’s Water Footprint. Glorynel served several terms in the Board of Directors at the U.S. Green Building Council –  Caribbean Chapter and was part of the Regionalization Project for the LEED v4 Reference Guides. She was a fellow in the IGERT program, Natural-Human Systems in the Urbanizing Tropics, based at the University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus. She was Research Assistant of the National Institute of Energy and Island Sustainability (INESI) and assembled the first Catalogue of Resources in Energy and Sustainability of the University of Puerto Rico. Before Hurricanes Irma and Maria hit Puerto Rico and the collapse of the power grid, she was coordinating the Energy Stakeholders Forum for multi-sectoral dialogue on energy transition.