Student Information
Graduate StudentInnovation in Global Development
College of Global Futures
I'm Ecuadorian. I have been working in the field of higher education, science and technology policy management and research for the last six years in Ecuador. I hold a Master Degree in Sociology from the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO), and I’m currently pursuing the Innovation in Global Development PhD program at ASU.
My work has focused on the creation, implementation, and assessment of policies specifically in Scientific Research, Higher Education, and Urban and Rural Community Development. My professional experience has allowed me to develop good communication skills with different groups, including grassroot organizations, community representatives, politicians, public servants, and scientific researchers. I have coordinated several science policy workshops which attracted diverse attendees, encouraged their active participation in integrative group work, and conducted a prioritizing and negotiating processes which allowed us to define key issues that the Ecuadorian public would like to be addressed by the scientific community.
These experiences highlighted for me the importance of considering the social and biological dimensions of the ecosystem, the value of holistic approaches to conservation involving diverse management and governance strategies, the need for fostering interdisciplinary participation, and the value of involving local actors in monitoring and evaluation.
My sociological background, and 13+ years of experience working in public policy and management have inspired me to pursue an academic degree whereby I could dedicate myself to exploring knowledge production systems, looking at the interaction between different societal actors, and delving into science policy analysis.
My academic curiosity came about organically through my professional experience. I was pursuing my master’s degree while working as an advisor on urban and rural development projects, and then later as a political analyst. My main motivation for studying a master’s degree in political sociology was born out of the questions regarding the workings of the relationship between the State and social organizations that I came across in my work.
Upon earning my master’s degree, I worked as a researcher in a study entitled “The Return of the State and the Turn Towards the Left in Latin America” (Pink Tide), which analyzed how in the last decade, governmental agendas in countries in the region had dual direction: 1) to promote policies aimed towards greater equality, social justice, and new forms of people’s participation and recognition of citizenship, and 2) to create strong, centralized States with larger capacities for intervention and regulation of the economy and society. This study was a comparative analysis of four Latin American countries.
I later worked in the field of higher education in Science, Technology, and Innovation (STI). It was here that I identified the imperative need to carry out studies in more depth and with a broader scope such as in a PhD program. My interests widened towards an interdisciplinary perspective. This interest became consolidated when I was promoted to Undersecretary of Scientific Research in Ecuador. My achievements in this position include: 1) writing of a conceptual and technical document to orient research in biodiversity, with a look at achieving equal distribution of the resources and benefits of the research, 2) analyzing protocols of relationships between scientists and local communities, and 3) categorizing public research institutions, which evidenced different logics of governance among different sectors such as energy, agriculture, biodiversity, and defense, among others.
