Faculty & Staff

I joined WPI in 2011 as a scholar and teacher with training in public health, environmental policy, and international development studies. My research and teaching interests focused on the environment-development nexus, where tensions between sustainability and livelihoods often lead to contentious policy debates. My work on soy production and land inequality, expert roundtables and certification, and sustainability rating systems for cities, advanced ideas around how global discourses about sustainable agriculture and sustainability indicators take shape, are mobilized, and have influence at ...

I possess a strong commitment to student education, and a goal of mine is to stimulate students' critical thinking and problem-solving abilities. Recently, students and I have been on a journey to open classroom content and discussions in an interdisciplinary and inclusive way. Students are challenged to rethink their role as active knowledge producers beyond the class as students become co-authors of open educational resources. For example, students are co-authors of multiple texts, like Extinction Stories, Climate Lessons, and Current Challenges in Biodiversity and Conservation. More ...

I am a geographer with a focus on the cultural landscape, meaning landscapes that are shaped by people. I am interested in development, how and why places change, and why certain traditions endure. I study this mainly through vernacular architecture (traditional regional design). My research was based in the Indian Himalaya and explores what connections forest policy and cash crop markets have with the decline in architectural woodcarving and vernacular design. I hope to better understand how modernization and preservation can be balanced to sustain culturally distinct landscapes. Previous to ...

Grant completed his Ph.D. in Political Science at the University of New Mexico with sub-field specializations in Comparative Politics and International Relations. His dissertation analyzed infrastructure investments and sustainable development in Brazil, focusing on the policymaking process in Brazil’s developmental state and the socio-environmental impacts of hydroelectric dams in the Amazon. His principal research interests include political economy, the environment, renewable energy, social welfare, democratic institutions, and populism. Currently, he is working on two manuscripts: a ...

You never know who might read a faculty bio—a student, a parent, a potential employer, or a long, lost friend—so I write with this in mind. I will admit, talking about myself is not my favorite task, and writing a bio feels a bit self indulgent. I entered academia through a side door, mostly because I loved college and never wanted to leave. After graduating from UConn with a BA in English, I worked as a receptionist in the UConn development office, answering calls including those from my parents inquiring as to whether they had overpaid for my degree. Soon though, I leveraged that experience ...

Fabio is the director of the Venice Project Center (VPC) and Santa Fe Project Center (SFPC). In addition to a number of scientific papers, his work has been repeatedly featured in National Geographic magazine, MIT’s Technology Review magazine, the Smithsonian magazine, Wired, New Scientist and Science. He was also featured on RAI play, BBC Radio and in a National Geographic video dedicated to his work in his hometown of Venice, Italy.Fabio’s main research focus has been on complex emergent systems and in particular on the gradual and systematic accumulation of urban and environmental ...

John-Michael holds a diverse academic background with degrees in psychology, water management, environmental studies, and geography – which rightly embodies the interdisciplinary approach to research cultivated in the DIGS. His work follows a common theme that values community-driven and action oriented research to address complex development challenges related to sustainable livelihoods, informal economies, waste management, environmental contamination, community representation, and INGO legitimacy. Involving communities and local stakeholders within all phases of the research process is ...

A public interest lawyer in my previous life, I was drawn to academia by its capacity to help facilitate attitudinal changes, foster dialogue, and inspire students to be ethically minded leaders. I thrive on the energy of students, particularly when I see them develop a newfound confidence and excitement for learning.Drawing on my environmental policy knowledge, and awareness of the mental health aftermath of the COVID-19 induced shutdown, in 2022, I explored creation of a program that could facilitate student project work and increase student connections with nature. In the fall of 2023, in ...

Zoë Antoinette Eddy (she/her/hers) is a researcher, educator, and advocate dedicated to re-imagining learning. She received her joint-PhD in social anthropology and archaeology from Harvard University (GSAS Class of 2019). She has taught in a range of disciplines, including gender studies, environmental studies, history of science, literature, and critical media studies. She is the elected Vice Chair of the Board for RedRover. In the past, she has also served as board member for The Society of Ethnobiology. Research and Teaching Interests: anthropology, critical media studies, Indigenous ...

Katherine Foo, PhD MLA, is co-director of the Berlin Project Center and an assistant teaching professor in the Integrative and Global Studies Department at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Her research focuses on urban environmental governance and landscape visualization for social and environmental justice. She is passionate about fostering institutional change to empower community groups by building academic-civic partnerships.  Through engaged, inclusive practices like participatory mapping, scenario development, and design-build ...

For twenty years I conducted research at Clark University on the social aspects of environmental risks, with a focus on the topics of risk communication, public trust, and vulnerability. After a brief sojourn at the EcoTarium (a museum of science and nature located in Worcester), I began teaching at WPI in 2006. I have taught more than 600 students in ID2050 and advised more than 100 IQPs in the UK (London and Worcester), US (Nantucket, Washington, DC, and Worcester), Australia, New Zealand, Puerto Rico, and Switzerland. As center director, I am responsible for identifying project topics and ...

Before coming to WPI in 2004,  Bob worked for a number of years as a Fellow at Resources for the Future, a non-profit organization in Washington, DC that conducts research and policy analysis on environmental quality and natural resources,  and as the Brownfields Director at the Center for Public Environmental Oversight (CPEO).  His broad substantive interests include regional food systems, contaminated site cleanup and revitalization, community participation in environmental decision-making, ethnographic filmmaking, and more recently, development projects in squatter settlements in Southern ...

My field is rhetoric, and I teach writing as a form of inquiry and problem solving. One challenge in my teaching is to get students to see writing that way. It is not simply window dressing for ideas they already have; writing is a way to create and test ideas, to engage in a dialogue with a community of readers who need to know what they have to say and will likely have something to say back. Some students approach their first college writing assignment as an exercise in demonstrating they can quote from expert sources, organize paragraphs, and punctuate sentences. They are surprised (and in ...

My teaching, research, and community engagement is integrated through my participation in WPIs Global Projects Program, where I help students prepare for and conduct projects in places such as London, Venice, Puerto Rico, Denmark, Washington and Worcester. Through the WPI Cape Town Project Centre (2007-15), my work was an exercise in Shared Action Learning (SAL), which as described to students and others is a way to think about and engage in partnerships for sustainable community development. SAL emphasizes Sharing among partners of ideas, knowledge, resources, inspiration and compassion; ...

I am an economic anthropologist who conducts both interdisciplinary and applied research. I study global issues from an ethnographic perspective examining local phenomena and placing it within their global context. My work has covered a variety of topics from spirituality and health to remittance strategies of Peruvian migrants. My dissertation research, funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation, examined the use of microfinance loans on rural livelihoods in Nicaragua. My current work is on the social and solidarity economy and its intersection with sustainable development.I truly ...

I am a medical anthropologist, global health researcher and feminist scholar, whose research focuses on issues of gender, sexuality and health. I am primarily interested in the HIV pandemic and have conducted research on HIV prevention and treatment in various countries in Africa. I have held teaching positions at the College of the Holy Cross (MA), where I taught undergraduate courses on global health (e.g., Intro to Global Health, Health and Development, Mixed-Methods in Health Research, HIV/AIDS in Global Perspective) and coordinated the health studies program. At Clark University (MA), ...

Stephen McCauley is a geographer whose work focuses on exploring how cities change and how urban futures can be inclusive, green and resilient. His broad substantive interests include climate change preparedness, urban resilience, energy system innovation, community participation in environmental decision-making, citizen science, and GI Science for urban planning. His current work addresses urban heat island dynamics and green infrastructure and other planning interventions that can mitigate the vulnerabilities associated with extreme heat in cities. At WPI, Stephen co-directs (with Lorraine ...

My areas of expertise in philosophy and social theory are in social and political philosophy, Marxism, global justice, development ethics, and also Critical Pedagogies that help center Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in my teaching and research. I teach philosophy courses, global studies courses, and for the Great Problems Seminars program (currently I co-teach the Seeking Sustainability and the Climate Change courses for this program).In addition to a number of chapters in edited collections, my work can be found in journals such as Human Studies, The European Legacy, Crisis and Critique, ...

Kent Rissmiller completed studies in political science at Muhlenberg College (AB) and Syracuse University (PhD). Along the way, he also completed a JD at the University of New Hampshire Law School, where he worked in the Energy Law Institute. Professor Rissmiller also worked for three years as an attorney for the Public Service Commission of Nevada, where he was involved in setting rates and policies for electric and water utilities. At WPI, Professor Rissmiller teaches government, law, and public policy. He also directs the Pre-Law program and oversees the Law and Technology minor. One of his ...

Laura Roberts is an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Integrative and Global Studies department at Worcester Polytechnic Institute and Director of the Worcester Community Project Center (WCPC). The WCPC is one of 50+ WPI project centers around the world, where students engage in hands-on, community-based research projects exploring topics situated at the intersection of society and technology. In this role, Professor Roberts facilitates global learning opportunities with local community organizations where students investigate pressing global issues without stepping on a plane. Prior to ...

 The overarching goal of my teaching and research is to contribute to an interdisciplinary understanding of environmental governance and policy. More specifically, I focus on the building of individual, organizational and institutional capacities to participate in collaborative efforts to address complex social and environmental sustainability problems through the application of science and technology.My academic and professional background includes experience in molecular biology, microbial ecology, wildlife biology, sustainable forestry and most recently environmental policy and ...

 William San Martín (He/Him/El) is Assistant Professor of Global Environmental Science, Technology, and Governance in the Department of Integrative and Global Studies at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. He is also a Scholar affiliated with the Climate Social Science Network (CSSN) at Brown University and a Research Fellow at the Earth Systems Governance Project at Utrecht University.An interdisciplinary scholar trained in environmental history and science and technology studies (STS), William examines the intersections of nitrogen’s ...

Ingrid Shockey is an environmental sociologist whose work concerns natural literacy and the interplay of human-wilderness relationships. These domains include topics in biodiversity loss, climate change perceptions, and our sense of place and identity with respect to the landscape. Her work has focused most recently on mountain ecologies and economies in the western Himalaya. She manages and curates two undergraduate student Project Centers, serving as co-director for the Wellington Project Center in New Zealand (since 2012) and directing the WPI-IIT Mandi India Project Center at the Indian ...

Sarah Stanlick, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Integrative and Global Studies and the Director of the Great Problems Seminar at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. She was the founding director of Lehigh University’s Center for Community Engagement and faculty member in Sociology and Anthropology. She previously taught at Centenary College of New Jersey and was a researcher at Harvard’s Kennedy School, assisting the US Ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power. She has published in journals such as The Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, The ...

Prof Stoddard is a human-environment geographer who is interested in the intersection of nature, society, and justice, particularly in the context of climate change. She looks at the ways in which we can design for climate resilience, in terms of infrastructure, location specific practices, and through community resilience. Stoddard also looks at the vulnerability and resilience of food systems to disasters (climate, disease outbreaks, etc.), and the impacts for humans, animals, and ecosystems. She looks at the ways in which technology, policies, and social movements ...

Sarah Strauss was born and raised on the east coast. During high school and college, she was deeply involved in biomedical research, and expected her career path to lie in this direction. She enjoyed the philosophical traditions, though, and so although she worked in molecular biology laboratories, she also majored in comparative religion. During her final year in college, she discovered medical anthropology, and that changed everything. A career in anthropology would allow her to pursue all of her research interests, from health and human biology to myth and religion. After graduating, she ...

 Seth has been part of the WPI community since 2001, as teacher, advisor, co-director of the Global Lab, and co-director of project centers. He is the co-Director of the Boston Project Center and was the co-Director of the Bangkok Project Center from 2011-2018. He enjoys exposing students to contemporary problems in environmental and public health policy making and challenging them to apply insights emerging from research to practical applications. He loves share his curiosity with students about the ways that people are impacted by different technological and natural ...

As a Senior Fellow in WPI’s Center for Project-Based Learning, which I established in 2016, I work with colleagues across campus to help advance project-based learning at colleges and universities around the nation and the globe. We also support project-based learning here on the WPI campus. Most of my scholarly and professional activity has centered around experiential and international education. Through my involvement in organizations such as the Association of American Colleges and Universities and the American Society for Engineering Education, I work to promote WPI’s approach to ...

Project-based learning is an enormously powerful approach to education. I've been changed by it; I've watched students be changed by it. I've seen faculty develop a renewed sense of joy in teaching from using it. And now, after over a decade of using PBL with students, I'm embarking on a new phase of helping faculty implement PBL through the work of the Center for Project-Based Learning. The good news - working with faculty on PBL is as much fun as working with students!