CONSERVATION EXPERIENCE

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As a Caribbean Climate Resilience Stanback Fellow, I worked on EDF's Fisheries and Oceans team in their San Fransisco office. I designed a large-scale poster on mangrove creek restoration and contributed to a national mangrove restoration roadmap for The Bahamas. I also co-wrote a blog post about EDF’s work in participatory mapping for blue bond milestones in Belize and assisted with grant writing for funding the designation of a new protected area in Belize.

During a fellowship with Duke Restore as their Coral Team Lead, I created a consulting service which provides pro bono technical and capacity support to coral reef restoration organizations. I developed and maintained relationships with four partner organizations, and recruited, mentored and managed ten students on five different consulting projects. As part of this role, I trained students in Eastern Tropical Pacific reef fish identification and remote underwater video analysis techniques, and developed data processing methods for Galapagos Reef Revival. To conclude the year, I led a survey of coral populations at the Duke Marine Lab, including developing research questions and methods, procuring equipment, training seven undergraduate students on protocols, developing a safety and risk management plan for field work, planning logistics for a two day field course, and supervising field research activities

I developed and delivered a workshop series to Comisión Nacional de Áreas Naturales Protegidas (CONANP) and Corales Vivos employees in Spanish on data science, R coding, and fish identification, working towards the capacity-building goals of Cozumel National Marine Park’s management plan and Coral Reef Alliance’s reef restoration projects. We covered topics such as data transformation, biodiversity analyses, and data visualization.

As a Bilingual Naturalist at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, I delivered presentations to international audiences of over 500 on marine conservation topics like deep sea mining, sustainable fisheries, wildlife rehabilitation, ocean plastics, and climate change. I provided exhibit interpretation in Spanish and English to increase accessibility and inclusivity.

As a dive instructor for Blue Endeavors, I teach marine ecology and train middle and high school students in research diving in Monterey and on expeditions worldwide. I lead dives using underwater survey methods and reef restoration techniques. On a recent expedition to Roatan, I helped train local students in diving skills to work towards the goal of becoming divemasters. I also acted as a Spanish-English interpreter for Honduran students and U.S. dive professionals. As a Science Communication Intern, I wrote ocean conservation project briefs, blog posts, social media posts, and literature reviews.

The Sunflower Star Lab aims to restore California kelp forests by reintroducing the sunflower star, a keystone species. As a lab volunteer, I cultivate bat stars and purple urchins by maintaining algae culture growth, monitoring algae growth by taking cell counts, and feeding this algae to the echinoderms. I also monitor their growth by taking larvae counts and measurements, and build new lab equipment.

As a Development Intern for Coral Reef Alliance, I researched facts and figures about coral reefs for external publications, wrote for the CORAL blog, created marine conservation posts for social media, and compiled information on grants. I also increased fundraising by using Salesforce and Excel to build donor profiles, fundraised for CORAL’s silent auction, and reached out to Facebook funders. By initiating contact with mid-level donors and cultivating relationships, I increased donation amounts by 66%.