CLASS OF 2016
Farzaneh Eftekhari
Prior coming to MDes program, Farzaneh Eftekhari conducted research on health risk communication in vulnerable population in rural areas in Mexico and immigrant communities in Lisbon, Portugal. As a product designer, she identified a new platform for diabetes education and preventative program through object experience and brand design. Considering the climate change risk’s conflicts, she is interested to look at disaster prone dense neighborhoods in large cities and design an educational platform to improve resilience of the community toward natural disasters.
Cristóbal Fuentes
Prior to his studies at Harvard University GSD, he studied architecture at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and he obtained a masters in Urban Design (MPUR) from the same university. His final thesis focused on a particular neighborhood in the Chilean city of Talca where he explored how the local universities could collaborate in the reconstruction and revitalization efforts after the 2010 earthquake, his work was selected as the best thesis of the program for the year 2012. Cristobal has collaborated with the urban development division of the Chilean Ministry of Housing, working with the team that worked on the design of a new capital for Palena after the eruption of Chaiten volcano, He has also collaborated with Talca’s municipal government after tthe 2010 earthquake and he has worked with the Chilean firms REC Arquitectos and LIKE Arquitectura. At the GSD, he has been focused in researching urban risk in Chilean intermediate cities and he is a research assistant at Harvard’s ZOFNASS Program for Sustainable Infrastructure.
Dave Hampton
A practicing architect for 20 years, Dave’s experience includes living systems (green roofs, vertical gardens), energy-efficiency, and building deconstruction and resource conservation advocacy with Urban Habitat Chicago and the Delta Institute. From 2010-2013, he worked with Architecture for Humanity, J/P Haitian Relief Organization, UN-Habitat, and Internews to help manage the transition from emergency response to neighborhood redevelopment in Port-au-Prince. In 2014, he participated in Resilient Bridgeport with the WB unabridged w/ Yale ARCADIS Rebuild by Design team led by Waggonner & Ball Architects of New Orleans. In 2015, he contributed to the Harvard GSD student team’s finalist-winning entry for the Boston Living with Water competition. Dave is also a certified Passive House ™ consultant, a contributing author at UrbDeZine, and creator ofmessysystems.com. Prior to beginning the Mdes program, Dave established re:ground llc, a consultancy providing expertise for the integration of natural systems and built environments to clients in international development, urban, and post-disaster contexts. His research interests are risk transfer legacies and pathways to resilience through constructed/restored ecologies in post-colonial coastal contexts. Currently, he is investigating the impacts of technological and economic changes on the ecology of coastal development corridors in Cuba in the context of an evolving relationship with the United States. Email: [email protected]
Shanika Hettige
Shanika Hettige is an American born Sri Lankan who was raised in the Philippines. Her primary interests lie in pre-emptive action for minimizing the impacts of coastal and flood-related hazards.Shanika received a Bachelors of Science in Urban and Regional Studies from the Cornell University Department of City and Regional Planning. Her undergraduate honors thesis made the case that metropolitan coastal regions – Southern Manhattan in particular – should focus on the robustness of lifeline sectors such as transportation, information, waste services, electricity, gas, and water in order to reduce vulnerability. Currently, she hopes to develop an actionable transition approach to tackle the tangled issues of flood-risk vulnerability based fundamentally on risk communication, nature and natural based features, and urban acupuncture methods.
Seung Kyum Kim
Seung Kyum Kim, LEED AP, has had many years working experiences in the fields of landscape architecture, urban planning, and international cooperation in both private and public sectors in the United States and South Korea. His recent works on a large infrastructural project and international cooperation have expanded his interest of current challenges facing the practice of risk management interplaying between politics, resilience and infrastructure development. He was awarded the Presidential Citation for his outstanding riverfront development works from the President of the Republic of Korea.
Namik Mačkić
More to come soon…
Evangeline McGlynn
Evangeline McGlynn is a GIS and information management specialist seeking an Mdes in Risk and Resilience. Immediately prior to her enrolment in the Graduate School of Design, Evangeline worked as a regional GIS and IM specialist in the Middle East. Her main projects in that region included information services to the humanitarian community on the Syria refugee crisis as well as longer term assessments and capacity building in Yemen.
Evangeline holds a BS from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in Cartography/GIS as well as a certificate in Russian, Eastern European, and Central Asian Studies, the latter of which she put to use when she lived in Kyrgyzstan for three years. She has also worked in the software industry as an interaction designer.
In the Mdes program, Evangeline’s research interests include finding ways to facilitate more inclusive disaster response, particularly in regions vulnerable to social conflict.
Oscar Natividad Puig
Oscar Natividad Puig is a licensed architect, graduate of the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, and a Fulbright Fellow pursuing an MDes in Risk and Resilience at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. During an exchange program at the Technische Universität Berlin (2009/2010), he worked on a reconstruction project in Chile. Through this initiative, he became co-founder and Director of Project Management of the organization Reclaiming Heritage e.V (RH), an association actively working in Chile and Haiti since 2010. Oscar worked for the Center of Public Policies in Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile in 2011 and developed Subsidized Social Housing projects for GWA Studio in Pretoria, South Africa in 2012. Shortly before beginning his MDes, Oscar led on-site logistics and community involvement management for the latest reconstruction project of RH in Croix-des-Bouquets, Haiti: Rebuild Haiti Homes. Oscar is interested in fostering the intersection in between design-based disciplines and social sciences. His research focuses on building a broader understanding of risk, developing a flexible framework for urban risk assessment, and testing it in the specific case of Haiti. Email: [email protected]
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