Fellowships

Sigride Asseko

Sigride Asseko is a PhD student in Public Health. She is interested in environmental exposures and their health outcomes in developing countries. Her current research focuses on air pollution awareness and exposure levels in Gabon. The Evan’s Fellowship will help support her travel to meet and disseminate knowledge to the collaborators and community members in Gabon. This work will provide the needed information to push for more studies and regulations on air pollution in the country.

David Evitt

David Evitt is is a 2022 National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow and graduate student in Mechanical Engineering. His research focuses on how to best apply fan-driven jets of air to reduce smoke emissions from wood stick cooking fires around the world. Support from the Evans Fellowship will allow him to build the combustion chambers and instrumentation for a design of experiments study to explore scaling rules for how to apply fan-driven jets of under-fire primary air to a wide variety of combustion chambers.

Ethan Copple

Ethan Copple is a 2022 National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow and graduate student in Applied Anthropology and Industrial Engineering. His research focuses on healthcare systems improvement, particularly in lower income nations. He studies how systems improvement tools can be integrated with local realities and understandings of health to remove barriers to accessing healthcare. The Fellowship will support his fieldwork to travel to Argentina to study how census data can be used to predict healthcare access and refine his methodological approach.

Zoe Rosenblum

Zoe Rosenblum is a PhD student in Geography. Her research explores transboundary wetlands as loci for peacebuilding. The Evans Fellowship will support her travel, along with the travel of 9 other graduate students, to study water technologies and transboundary water sharing schemes in the Jordan River Basin. The region serves as an exceptional example of water resources engineering and diplomacy bringing diverse cultures together.

Grant Ross

Grant Ross is a master’s student in Mechanical Engineering. A returned Peace Corps volunteer in Sierra Leone, Grant spent three months in Malawi in September 2021. There he conducted testing and research with global partners using sensors to measure impact of household energy technology interventions like cookstoves and other methods to reduce emissions. Support from the Evans Fellowship will help him to analyze and broadly share the results of this study.

2021 Fellows

Sevval Gulduren

Sevval Gulduren is a master's student in Mechanical Engineering. Her research focuses on the sedimentation processes in sand dams, particularly in Kenya. She studies effects of dams in sediment transport in ephemeral rivers by applying computational and experimental modeling techniques. The work is aimed to increase the efficiency of sand dams in order to provide more stored water to local community. The Evans fellowship will support her work to present and discuss her research with other professionals in AGU conference in New Orleans.
 

Faye Andrews

Faye Andrews is a PhD student in Public Health. She has interests in environmental exposures and their effects on vulnerable populations. Specifically, she currently researches how exposures to heavy metals effects maternal and child health in Bangladesh. The Evans Fellowship will help support her travel to meet and disseminate knowledge to the collaborators and cohort of mothers and children in Bangladesh. She will also attend an international conference with the generous support of the Evans Fellowship.

Nureen Anisha

Nureen Anisha is a doctoral student in Environmental Sciences Graduate Program. Her research is focused on a highly human-centric critical wetland in northeast Bangladesh. She is applying System Dynamics Modeling and Embodied Energy method to study the interaction among the water resources, agricultural and socioeconomic subsystems in the wetland region in order to integrate the rural social and economic dynamics into wetland management. The Evans fellowship will support her fieldwork in Bangladesh.

Heather Miller

Heather Miller is a masters student in Mechanical Engineering. Her work is aimed at increasing contextual understanding of cookstove performance through the use of an integrated sensor system while also building capacity for independent research in local regions. Her Evans fellowship has allowed her to collaborate remotely with partners in Nepal to quantify the impact of a locally disseminated cookstove on fuel consumption and indoor air quality.

Sevval Gulduren

Sevval Gulduren is a master's student in Mechanical Engineering. Her research focuses on the sedimentation processes in sand dams, particularly in Kenya. She studies effects of dams in sediment transport in ephemeral rivers by applying computational and experimental modeling techniques. The work is aimed to increase the efficiency of sand dams in order to provide more stored water to local community.

Heather Miller

Heather Miller is a masters student in Mechanical Engineering. Her work is aimed at increasing contextual understanding of cookstove performance through the use of an integrated sensor system while also building capacity for independent research in local regions. Her Evans fellowship has allowed her to collaborate remotely with partners in Nepal to quantify the impact of a locally disseminated cookstove on fuel consumption and indoor air quality.

Sevval Gulduren

Sevval Gulduren is a master's student in Mechanical Engineering. Her research focuses on the sedimentation processes in sand dams, particularly in Kenya. She studies effects of dams in sediment transport in ephemeral rivers by applying computational and experimental modeling techniques. The work is aimed to increase the efficiency of sand dams in order to provide more stored water to local community.

Elnaz Hassanpour Adeh

Elnaz is a PhD candidate in water Resources Engineering. She is a part of the Nexus of Energy, Water and Agriculture Laboratory (NEWAg). Her research focuses on numerical and experimental investigation of the environmental impacts of renewable energies (wind and solar), mostly on agricultural fields. As a part of her works, she has started the field studies on solar panels, located in Oregon State University campus since 2015. In this research the microclimate variables, water demand and solar power efficiency have been studied with the final goal of an optimization-based design of solar panels. She will be using her Evans Fellowship for the ASABE international conference in Spokane WA, 2017 to present her research results.

Genevieve Schutzius

Genevieve is a master’s student in Environmental Engineering. She is interested in the spread of antibiotic resistant bacteria and genes from wastewater. As an Evans Fellow, she will be traveling to the University of Saigon in Vietnam to investigate resistance within urban septic tanks and in areas of their effluent disposal. The goal of this project is to help with global surveillance efforts that aim to minimize the potential human health risks posed by increased antibiotic resistance.

Amelia Snyder

Amelia is a master’s student in Water Resources Engineering. Her research focuses on helping the TAHMO project develop a framework for designing an optimal weather station network in Sub-Saharan Africa. She will be using her Evans Fellowship to travel to Benin and meet local counterparts to discuss their goals for the weather station network, visit proposed sites, and come to a consensus on the placement of the stations. She will integrate insights gained through this trip into future site selection processes.

Jen Ventrella

Jen is a PhD student in Mechanical Engineering. She is currently designing a sensor based system to quantify cookstove usage and impact in developing communities. Her first Evans Fellowship allowed her to travel to Guatemala with Dr. MacCarty and her students to study household energy use. With the current Evans Fellowship, she will be traveling to Honduras to field test the sensor prototype, engage the users in the preliminary design, and develop implementation and training methods for the sensor.

Barrett Welch

Barrett is a PhD student in Public Health. He is interested in environmental health issues concerning people in developing regions. Specifically, how exposure to metals in the environment effects the immune system and ensuing health outcomes. The Evan’s Fellowship will help support his research in Bangladesh to study potential sources of lead exposure among a cohort of children. This work is aimed at providing evidence needed to help families reduce their lead exposure.

Erin Glover

Erin is a Mathematics Education doctoral student at OSU’s College of Education. She has interests in supporting students to see and value the interdisciplinary nature of mathematics through the use of high-engagement instructional strategies and using real world issues as launching points for inquiry. The Evans Fellowship will provide support towards the development of local community partnerships and course materials and curricula for the upcoming HEST 310 course, Introduction to Community Engagement and Co-Design.

Jennifer Ventrella

Jen is a PhD student in Mechanical Engineering. She is interested in researching the design of energy systems in rural, developing areas. Thanks to the Evans Fellowship, she will be able to accompany Dr. MacCarty's students to Antigua, Guatemala to install increased efficiency biomass cookstoves and conduct usability studies following their installation. Jen will then use her research and experience as a basis for future projects.

Elizabeth Jachens

Elizabeth is a master’s student in Water Resources Engineering. In January 2016, Liz traveled to Kenya for a TAHMO/GLOBE teacher’s training in Kenya to give teachers the tools to discuss scientific observations of atmospheric and hydrologic variables in the classroom. Liz will use what she learned from the first training to hold an improved second training for Uganda in spring 2017 for teachers who recently have had TAHMO weather stations. She will also visit local schools as part of TAHMO’s School 2 School (S2S) initiative. Liz is enthusiastic about this extension and follow-up to her first trip, further reinforcing relationships and improving TAHMO and the S2S Program.

Rachel Adams

Rachel is an MS student in civil engineering. Her research focuses on soil instability during earthquakes and tsunamis. In particular, she focuses on how critical buildings and infrastructure respond during natural hazards, with the goal of increasing community resilience in seismically active areas worldwide. She also has an interest in engineering education and has been involved in the development and implementation of visual demonstration models into the classroom. The Evans Fellowship enables Rachel to accompany her adviser to Nepal for capacity-building, education and research in earthquake engineering.

Lauren Bomeisl

Lauren is an MS PCMI student in Water Resources Engineering. She is interested in examining agricultural buffering efficiency influenced by forestry spatial design. With the Evans Fellowship, she will be traveling to Ecuador in the Summer of 2016 to collect water and soil samples in the Babahoyo River Basin, interview local agricultural producers, and connect with land management bureaus. Lauren intends to use her research to inform potential projects while serving through PCMI.

Phylicia Cicilio

Phylicia is an MS student in Electrical Engineering with research interests in the reliability of microgrids, with particular application in rural environments. She is currently working on integrating existing diesel microgrids in rural Alaska with renewable energy and energy storage. including reliability and cost-benefit analyses. The Evans Fellowship will help support both stipend and field study expenses.

Susan Elliott

Susan is an MS student in Water Resources Engineering. Her current research involves hydraulic systems and their influence on the spread of invasive plants. She will be using her Evans Fellowship to support research in Ethiopia's Wabe Shebelle watershed in water quantity and quality.  Working with the International Water Management Institute's East Africa Office, Susan will visit current monitoring sites and gauges, construct rainfall models with historical and current project data, and contribute to research surrounding the impact of El Nino on selected agro-ecologies of Ethiopia. 

Elizabeth Jachens

Elizabeth is a master’s student in Water Resources Engineering. She will be attending a GLOBE teacher’s training in Kenya focused on giving teachers tools to discuss scientific observations of atmospheric and hydrologic variables in the classroom. Elizabeth will then coordinate a teacher training scheduled for next summer, building upon the previous training with location specific portions for science and geography teachers in Uganda as part of Trans African Hydro-Meteorological Observatory TAHMO's School 2 School Program.

Bonnie Ruder

Bonnie is a PhD student in medical anthropology and a graduate research assistant for the ADVANCE grant at OSU. Her research examines the lived experience and quality of life for women suffering from obstetric fistula. Since 2011, she has worked with TERREWODE, a Ugandan NGO dedicated to serving these women. She is working with a team of engineering students to develop a sustainable income-generating project for fistula survivors, goat-milk soap. The Evans Fellowship will support implementation of the project and development of additional capstone projects.

Thomas Mosier

Thomas is earning a dual-major PhD in water resources engineering and mechanical engineering. His research focuses on improving tools for modeling the impacts of climate change on streamflow in mountain regions. Thomas is applying these tools to the Indus Basin in Asia and using the results of his streamflow analysis to understand effects of climate change on small-scale hydropower potential within the region. The tools that Thomas develops are all open source, easy to implement for any global land area, and distributed at GlobalClimateData.org. 

Megan Richardson

Megan Richardson is a master’s student studying mechanical engineering through the Peace Corps Master’s International Program. Her community-based project in Tanzania will be developed around the desires and needs of the community she will be living with while serving in the Peace Corps.

Leah Tai

Leah Tai is a master’s student in water resources engineering. She has been working with the Trans African Hydro-Meteorological Observatory (TAHMO) to create networks between schools in the US and Kenya. This knowledge exchange involves installing on-site weather monitoring stations and motivating investigation by students of local and global weather.

Jon Viducich

Jon Viducich is a master’s student in water resources engineering focusing on the sedimentation processes in sand dams. His research interests include rainwater harvesting techniques, sediment transport in ephemeral rivers, and the intersections between water and agriculture in water-scarce regions. Jon is also working on the TAHMO project.

Sahar Beheshti Zavareh

Sahar Beheshti Zavareh is a PhD student in Geography focusing on sustainable water financing projects. By combining her background in women’s’ advocacy with her current studies, Sahar’s research “targets underserved communities in all aspects from financing to engineering, by engaging in their participation to fully take charge of the project and its maintenance, once it has been fully implemented.”