Director of Community Solutions, Community Water Center
Heather is the Director of Community Solutions at the Community Water Center. Heather’s work and research focuses on community-based natural resource management and how to better conduct research with, and for, underserved rural communities. She has worked both internationally and domestically, including a study investigating the sustainability of rural water supply systems in Bolivia. Heather’s dissertation focused on factors associated with participation in grassroots community groups working to restore and protect rivers and streams in Appalachia. Specifically, she considered the relationships between the extent and form of an individual’s watershed group participation and his or her sense of place, perceived self-efficacy, and watershed group efficacy. While at Stanford, Heather received the Centennial Teaching Assistant Award for outstanding teaching. Heather holds a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in environmental engineering from MIT. She completed her PhD in the Emmett Interdisciplinary Program in Environment and Resources (E-IPER) in 2014.