teaching, service, and the outdoors
The following is a snapshot of the recent and current activities, both teaching and personal, that I am passionate about.
Carishina en Bici
Since I started my fieldwork I am a member of a feminist cycling collective that does awesome radical work around gender empowerment, climate justice, and social justice. I believe in engaged and activist work, involving theory and practice. I cycle and work with them when I am in Quito, and jealous when I can't do more on the ground work. The collective promotes and empowers women to cycle in Quito through giving classes, doing fun activities, and protesting.
Barrio Bolaños
I believe in teaching by engaging with local context. For example, in my Urban Sociology course that I taught at Universidad San Francisco we designed and conducted a survey on issues such as risk, environment, and security to better comprehend what the residents thought about their neighborhood. The current Municipal administration in Quito under Mayor Mauricio Rodas is threatening to displace a neighborhood in Quito, Bolaños, to build a modernist bridge that will in theory reduce traffic. We worked with the local non-profit Acción Ecológica and the neighborhood leadership to design and conduct this survey.
Outdoors and Ecuador
By now you can tell I like cycling and I love Quito. Ecuador has been a great place to also personally explore extreme outdoor activities. I had the opportunity to do a lot of Andean hiking and was able to get up some amazing peaks like Cayambe, Imbabura, and both Iliniza peaks. The country is beautiful and biodiverse. For more information on travel, please look out for my friend's travel magazine.