Grad-Awards

Kate Little Receives the Injury and Violence Prevention Student Research Award from the Colorado School of Public Health

Gabriela Rocha Sales — Fri, 03 Jan 2025 21:53:25 +0000

Kate Little Receives the Injury and Violence Prevention Student Research Award from the Colorado School of Public Health Gabriela Rocha Sales Fri, 01/03/2025 - 14:53

Kate Little has received the Injury and Violence Prevention Student Research Award from the Colorado School of Public Health for her project Understanding Drivers of Firearm Access Among Colorado American Indian Youth: Opportunities for School-Level Prevention.

Project Background: American Indian and Alaska Native youth have a high risk for death by firearm suicide and tend to have quick access to firearms in Colorado. Firearm access is the most easily modifiable risk factor to prevent a firearm suicide death. The high lethality of firearms and short time window between suicide ideation and action require that researchers develop a nuanced understanding of the individual and ecological characteristics of youth with firearm access, as these factors may be directly associated with risk of death by firearm. Understanding how youth acquire firearms and who has access, and the characteristics their schools access can inform school-based firearm suicide prevention strategies.

Project Design: The research project will use multilevel modelling techniques to understand how individual and school-level characteristics that are associated with individual firearm access among Native American and Alaska Native High School Students in Colorado, and how those characteristics differ from students of other identities.

Kate is pursuing a Master's degree in Geography at the ��«��Ƶ and is a Research Analyst at the Injury and Violence Prevention Center. Her work uses GIS and statistical methods to better understand firearm harms among youth and adults and how they vary geographically. This award will support her work in investigating the contexts of the schools in which Indigenous Colorado youth gain access to firearms. She is passionate about effectively communicating research to the affected communities and hopes that this award will help prevent firearm injuries and deaths among Indigenous Colorado youth.

Off

Traditional

White

Viviana Huiliñir-Curio Receives Wenner-Gren Fellowship for her Dissertation Research in Wallmapu/Chile

Gabriela Rocha Sales — Mon, 09 Dec 2024 22:21:30 +0000

Viviana Huiliñir-Curio Receives Wenner-Gren Fellowship for her Dissertation Research in Wallmapu/Chile Gabriela Rocha Sales Mon, 12/09/2024 - 15:21

Viviana Huiliñir-Curio

Viviana is a Mapuche scholar from Southern Chile and a graduate student in the Geography doctoral program at CU-��«��Ƶ. In her previous work in Chile, Viviana has been exploring the production of landscapes through various forms of Mapuche mobilities in the Andes borderlands in the context of colonialism, nation-state formations, commodification, and extractivism. Her areas of interest are at the intersection of cultural geography, political ecology, and critical Indigenous studies.

The Wenner-Gren Foundation supports doctoral research on anthropological knowledge, integrating two or more subfields. This dissertation fieldwork grant will fund a one-year-long fieldwork in Chile for her dissertation project called: “Green Borders: Protected Areas and Mapuche Mobilities in the Southern Andes in Wallmapu.” Her dissertation project explores the intersections between mobility, conservation, and dispossession from an Indigenous perspective, focusing on the role of national parks in transforming the Mapuche territory in the Andes borderlands.

"This doctoral program has been crucial in acquiring more theoretical and methodological perspectives for my dissertation project, especially in expanding my own perspectives about Indigenous geographies. Another important point for my personal and academic development is that the Geography department groups grad students worldwide, creating an international and cross-cultural environment. This has been very positive for connecting with grad students from different backgrounds, exchanging points of view, and building a respectful community. Therefore, the PhD has been a very enriching experience in many ways."

Off

Traditional

White

Shelby Ross Receives the BIE Science Post Graduate Scholarship Fund 2024-2025 provided by the Native Forward Scholars Fund

Gabriela Rocha Sales — Mon, 09 Dec 2024 22:06:42 +0000

Shelby Ross Receives the BIE Science Post Graduate Scholarship Fund 2024-2025 provided by the Native Forward Scholars Fund Gabriela Rocha Sales Mon, 12/09/2024 - 15:06

Shelby Ross

Aŋpétu Wašté' Mitákuyepi (Good Day Relatives),

My name is Shelby Ross, my Lakota name is Wanahca Oblaye Ska Win (White Prairie Flower Woman). I’m currently a Ph.D. candidate within the Geography Department at the ��«��Ƶ. I am an enrolled member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe and was born and raised on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in southwestern South Dakota. I am a former Gate’s Millennium Scholar (2009-2018), which I utilized to earn a B.S. in Natural Science with an emphasis in Conservation Biology from my local Tribal College Oglala Lakota College and a M.S. in Environmental Science and Engineering from the Institute of Environmental Health at the Oregon Health & Science University. After earning my master’s degree, I returned home and began working for the Oglala Sioux Tribe (OST) Natural Resource

s Regulatory Agency in Pine Ridge, SD. It was during this time that I have observed the extreme weather events happening across my home reservation, which seemed to be occurring more often. In my position at the Natural Resources office, I had access to the OST Tribal climate adaptation plan and was asked to analyze the plan looking for gaps. During this time, I observed limited information about the potential impacts of climate change on the health disparities that persist within our reservation communities. Since this observation, I have been dedicated to becoming an expert around the topic of climate change and Native American health in efforts to help our leaders prepare our people and next generations for the projected impacts of climate change for the Northern Great Plains region not only on human health but also on environmental/ecological health, which are intricately related.

I am a member of the 2020 Tribal Climate Leaders Program inaugural cohort, funded by the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center in partnership with the Cooperative Institute of Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES), ��«��Ƶ, and the Great Plains Tribal Water Alliance. My research interests include Traditional Ecological Knowledge or Indigenous Knowledge, climate change and health, and Native American health. I am currently at the stage of conducting data analysis and writing my dissertation. My dissertation, Climate change impacts on the Native American Health in the Northern Great Plains Region, was designed with a mixed methods approach to better understand how extreme weather events (EWE) induced by climate change are impacting Native American health in the Northern Great Plains region. I also aimed to investigate and assess the healthcare needs of the population of Native American individuals who have been diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes during EWE. It was important to me to develop my dissertation research through an Indigenous Knowledge of Health or Indigenous Health lens, which includes understanding how climate change may be impacting the physical, mental, and spiritual/cultural health for Native Americans in the region. In early stages of my program, I conducted interviews of elders on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation with an aim to understand what changes they have experienced over their lifetime on the topics of EWEs, the availability in ecological resources like traditional plants and wildlife, and health impacts caused by EWEs. The analysis of these interviews will be one chapter of my dissertation.

These interviews were then influential in designing my Extreme Weather impacts on Native American Health in the N. Great Plains survey. I distributed the survey to Native Americans (ages 18 and up) across the Northern Great Plains to investigate any variances in impacts felt (infrastructure, healthcare access, and cultural practices access) by Native Americans in this region due to EWEs. I am now analyzing the results from this survey with an eye towards evaluating how EWEs have affected infrastructure, healthcare access, and cultural practices access differentially by location, gender, age, education, employment status, health status (Type 2 Diabetes vs. non-Type 2 Diabetes), and reservation residency status.

I chose this mixed method (interviews and surveys) approach because I believe it is the best option for conducting research with Native American communities. Interviews and surveys allow me to center Native American voices as the experts of their experiences and provide a space for them to express their climate concerns.

As I continue my career as a Native American researcher who is an expert in climate change and Native American Health, my goal is to begin to provide practical climate action projects that can help minimalize the felt impacts of climate change for my home Tribal community and possibly continuing to extend my efforts to all Tribal communities in the Northern Great Plains region. The projects I want to continue to pursue are more community involved projects, emergency response systems that are designed in alignment with the needs of Tribal members in the region and are inclusive to health-related issues, and alternative energy sourcing. I also have a goal to provide a space that builds capacity in Native American climate change research led by Native Americans by becoming a professor and to do my part in educating the next generations of Native Americans in climate change adaptation as much as possible.

Description of the BIE scholarship (from the website):

“The purpose of the BIE Science Post Graduate Scholarship Fund program is to provide financial assistance to eligible American Indian and Alaska Native undergraduate, graduate, and professional students pursuing degrees full-time at an accredited institution in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields (i.e., Medical and Life Sciences; Engineering; Physical Sciences; Chemistry; Natural Resources/Conservation; Mathematics and Computational Sciences; Earth, Environmental, and Agriculture/Animal Sciences; Technology; Computer Sciences; Architectural Sciences; Public Health; Psychology; etc.). This opportunity is a need-based award.”

Off

Traditional

White

Sara Fleming Receives PACES Funding to Establish Collaborative Community Ownership Website for Mobile Home Park Preservation

Gabriela Rocha Sales — Mon, 09 Dec 2024 21:58:34 +0000

Sara Fleming Receives PACES Funding to Establish Collaborative Community Ownership Website for Mobile Home Park Preservation Gabriela Rocha Sales Mon, 12/09/2024 - 14:58

Sara Fleming

Sara Fleming is a second-year MA student in the Geography department working with Professor Jennifer Fluri. She is broadly interested in the intersection of housing crises, climate injustice, and financial capitalism. Her thesis research focuses on community-owned mobile home parks in Colorado, where residents have organized to form cooperatives, collectively purchase land, and govern it for the benefit of the community.

She received the PACES Tier 2 grant funding to help fund a community-led project in partnership with mobile home park residents that she met through her thesis fieldwork. The project aims to create a website that shares information, provides resources, and connects people who are interested in preserving mobile home parks in Colorado and transferring them to community ownership.

Off

Traditional

White

Millie Spencer awarded Fulbright Fellowship 2024-2025

Anonymous — Tue, 07 May 2024 16:48:56 +0000

Millie Spencer awarded Fulbright Fellowship 2024-2025 Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 05/07/2024 - 10:48

Millie Spencer has been awarded the 2024-2025 Fulbright-Nehru Research Fellowship.

She is currently doing field work in Concepción, Chile, analyzing glacier retreat and its impacts on downstream communities in south-central Chile.

The Chile Fulbright Science Initiative will enable her to expand her existing research in Chile further south to the region of Araucanía, where she plans to work with Mapuche-Pehuenche communities to document oral histories of glacier retreat and hydrological change, and illuminate how water insecurity disproportionately impacts Indigenous peoples.

Off

Traditional

White

Fedor Popov Receives TA Award

Anonymous — Sat, 20 Apr 2024 17:51:40 +0000

Fedor Popov Receives TA Award Anonymous (not verified) Sat, 04/20/2024 - 11:51

Fedor Popov was named the outstanding Geography Excellence in Graduate Teaching - Teaching Assistant in 2023-2024

Off

Traditional

White

Sarah Posner Receives TA Award

Anonymous — Sat, 20 Apr 2024 17:35:19 +0000

Sarah Posner Receives TA Award Anonymous (not verified) Sat, 04/20/2024 - 11:35

Sarah Posner was named the outstanding Geography Excellence in Graduate Teaching - Teaching Assistant in 2023-2024

Off

Traditional

White

Phurwa Gurung Awarded National Geographic Society Grant

Anonymous — Tue, 17 Oct 2023 23:03:06 +0000

Phurwa Gurung Awarded National Geographic Society Grant Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 10/17/2023 - 17:03

Doctoral candidate Phurwa Gurung was awarded a National Geographic Society Committee for Research and Exploration grant to work together with local Dolpopa scholars to document endangered oral literature in Dolpo, northwest Nepal.

National Geographic funds a global community of Explorers who investigate, test hypotheses, innovate, stretch their creativity, and push the boundaries of traditional thinking in ways that fundamentally change our world. They support and cultivate a portfolio of diverse, Explorer-led programs within their five focus areas to drive impact and fulfill their mission of illuminating and protecting our world. They leverage their global expertise, platforms, and unparalleled convening power to inspire educators, youth, and future Explorers and help more people learn about, care for, and protect our world. Their innovative business model allows them to invest every philanthropic dollar—100% of donations—directly to their Explorers and programs.

Off

Traditional

White

Phurwa Gurung Awarded Wenner Gren Foundation Dissertation Fieldwork Grant

Anonymous — Wed, 11 Oct 2023 15:32:41 +0000

Phurwa Gurung Awarded Wenner Gren Foundation Dissertation Fieldwork Grant Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 10/11/2023 - 09:32

Phurwa Gurung was awarded a Wenner Gren Foundation Dissertation Fieldwork Grant for his dissertation project, “Reordering highland territories: State-building, indigeneity and multispecies worldmaking in the Himalaya.” It will support his ongoing field research in Dolpo, Nepal, which uses caterpillar fungus (yartsa gunbu) as a lens onto state building processes, indigenous territoriality, the political ecology of conservation, and non-human agency.”

He got the announcement of the award at the end of September.

Off

Traditional

White

Christopher Picard wins geospatial intelligence scholarship

Anonymous — Sat, 16 Sep 2023 04:17:02 +0000

Christopher Picard wins geospatial intelligence scholarship Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 09/15/2023 - 22:17

Christopher Picard of CU ��«��Ƶ is one of 21 students nationwide to win support from United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation

Christopher Picard, a graduate student in geography at the ��«��Ƶ, is one of 21 students nationwide to win scholarships this year from the United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF), the foundation announced recently.

The USGIF’s 2023 scholarship awardees, who are studying geospatial intelligence and related fields, will receive a total of $125,000, raised from donations.

Ronda Schrenk, USGIF CEO, expressed her gratitude for the funding: “The support our community has shown for the scholarship program this year has been truly inspiring for us at the Foundation. We extend our heartfelt thanks to all the organizational and individual donors who have enabled USGIF to maintain and expand this crucial program.”

Picard, who is pursuing a master's degree in geography from CU ��«��Ƶ, is a recent graduate of Dartmouth College, where he received a BA in environmental Earth sciences.

While an undergraduate, Picard had an internship at the U.S. National Ice Center, where he was introduced to remote sensing of the cryosphere and learned about the importance of geospatial research to national security.

That experience led Picard to apply remote sensing and other computational techniques to the study of current and future changes in Earth's high-latitude regions.

Picard said he was honored to win a 2023 graduate scholarship. “I want to thank the USGIF for supporting young geospatial researchers, as this financial assistance and connection to a broader community is massively impactful for students entering the field,” he said, adding:

“Financially, this scholarship is significant to me because it will provide important funding that will help support me during my graduate studies. In addition to financial assistance, I am looking forward to engaging with this new community in graduate school and during my career.”

Off

Traditional

White