Science Diplomacy

APEC Senior Officials Meeting in Hanoi, Vietnam with US team, May 2017.

Jefferson Science Fellowship at the U.S. Department of State

I was selected to be a Jefferson Science Fellow at the U.S. Department of State through the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine during the 2016-2017 academic year. I worked in the Office of Economic Policy in the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs. Our office was responsible for coordinating U.S. involvement in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), in addition to other activities that included East Asia and the Pacific regions. 


APEC Women in STEM Workshop (Building a Pipeline for Girls and Women), Hanoi, Vietnam.

During my year as a fellow, I coordinated with the interagency (Health and Human Services, Department of Energy, etc.) to work with the following APEC Groups: Energy Working Group; Policy Partnership on Women and the Economy; Policy Partnership on Science, Technology, & Innovation; Automotive Dialogue; Mining Task Force; and Chemical Dialogue.


My non-APEC Regional projects were varied. I was the point of contact for the Bureau of East Asian & Pacific Affairs for the Our Ocean Conference, which was Secretary John Kerry's signature project to bring countries together to protect the oceans. 


Department of State staff who supported the Our Ocean Conference, September 2016.

Workshop for high school students at @America space in Jakarta, Indonesia.

I participated in a bilateral engagement with Embassy Jakarta about Air Quality Awareness. Over 100 high schoolers attended the event at @American, the public democracy space run by the Embassy. Three female professors talked about their research during the event to an audience of mostly female students.


Senior Economic Dialogue between the Republic of Korea and the U.S. in Washington D.C.

I also covered economic issues for the Republic of Korea, so participated in a Senior Economic Dialogue between Korea and the U.S. 


Continued Collaboration with the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Energy Working Group (EWG)

I have continued working with the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Energy Working Group (EWG) through the US Department of Energy. I have applied for funding from the APEC Secretariat to organize and host three different workshops with different themes. The first project involved using life-cycle analysis to think about the implications ofinvesting in clean energy. The last two projects have focused on bringing energy policymakers and university faculty together for discussions around Energy Efficiency, Renewable Energy, and Energy Resiliency. Policymakers identify the data and analysis that is important for making data driven policy decisions, and university faculty are developing collaborative projects to address these issues. 

Project 1: Making the Case for Clean Energy Investments with Life-Cycle Impact Assessments (May 2017-January 2018) 

Project 2: APEC Workshop on University Collaboration to Support Data Gathering and Analysis in Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (August 2019-January 2022) 

Project 3: Workshop on Furthering University Collaboration to Support Data Gathering and Analysis in Energy Efficiency, Renewable Energy, and Energy Resiliency (March 2022-April 2023)