Brooke Ann Zanetell

2001- 2002 CEIRP Fellow

Research Interest: International Environmental Management

Department: Natural Resources

I am a Ph.D. student in the Department of Natural Resources at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. My overarching passion is for environmental protection and preservation. I have a B.A. in Biology (Summa Cum Laude) and a B.A. in Environmental Conservation from the University of Colorado in Boulder. For several years I worked at the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory in Colorado as an aquatic ecosystem researcher and as the Public Programs Manager responsible for environmental outreach and education.

I began graduate school at Cornell in 1997. My specific research and career interest is the intersection of citizen participation and legal mechanisms that enable and encourage community-based stewardship, particularly of freshwater resources such as rivers, lakes, and watersheds. My Masters thesis summarizes research I conducted as a Fulbright Scholar in Venezuela on community-based fishery management, willingness to participate, and rapid rural appraisal to collect local knowledge. My dissertation examines global and local visions of collaboration in water resources management, drawing on a case-study of the Lake Atitlán watershed in Guatemala. I expect to complete my Ph.D. in May 2002.

In regard to CEIRP, education has been the gateway to many of my childhood dreams and I would like to help children dream bigger, imagine more, and gain confidence in themselves to open the gates to futures that they may not have realized were even there.