Habitat-USAID/BHA's International Humanitarian Shelter and Settlements fellowship cohort
Habitat-USAID/BHA’s International Humanitarian Shelter and Settlements research fellowship offers graduate students a chance to deepen their research and boost their careers, supporting their efforts with professional mentorship, networking opportunities and financial support.
Students gain firsthand experience in the shelter and settlements sector and lay critical groundwork for their professional futures.
Interested in applying?
Interested in becoming a future fellow? Learn more about the fellowship program and application process.
“The program fellows exemplify the kind of innovative and empathetic thought leadership that is needed in today’s world,” says Charles A. Setchell, senior shelter and settlements advisor of USAID/BHA.
“They are addressing some of the most vexing issues facing the humanitarian community with creative thinking and approaches, doing their part to improve the lives of populations affected by disasters and crises, while also raising the visibility of shelter and settlement concerns in North America.”
Learn about the inspiring work of the current and former fellows below.
Fellows not pictured: Shaye Lyn Palagi and Jessica Wolff (2017); Kirsten Larson and Jen Pepson (2014).
Congratulations to 2022 fellow Melina Holder
We would like to congratulate Melina Holder for presenting her fellowship deliverable as her master’s thesis, which was awarded the Zilberman prize for Outstanding Capstone from the Goldman School of Public Policy at University of California, Berkeley. We are honored that Habitat, InterAction and USAID staff, via our additional guidance and mentorship, were able to contribute to enhance the quality of her thesis.
We know Melina will make great strides in the humanitarian shelter and settlements sector and wish her the best in the years to come.
2023 cohort announcement
The U.S. Agency for International Development Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance in partnership with Habitat for Humanity and supported by InterAction has selected the three fellows below for its 2023 cohort.
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Andrea is a student in the Master of International Cooperation Sustainable Emergency Architecture program at the Universitat Internacional de Catalunya. She was recommended by Dr. Apen Ruiz Martinez, who is an associate lecturer for various institutions courses on gender and culture; anthropology of food and culture and identity in Hispanic societies; and qualitative research methodologies at the Universitat Internacional de Catalunya.
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Emily is a PhD candidate in the Mobility Dynamics in Climate Change Affected Communities program at the University of Sydney. She was recommended by Dr. Aaron Opdyke, who is a senior lecturer in humanitarian engineering at the University of Sydney.
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Daud is a student in the Master of City Planning program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was recommended by Dr. Gabriella Carolini, who is an associate professor of urban planning and international development at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
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As a Habitat-USAID/BHA fellow, Madeline is researching the shelter experiences of displaced Syrians in Lebanon and their interaction with humanitarian shelter programs over time. Her objective is to analyze the role of humanitarian programs in long-term shelter recovery through conducting interviews with local shelter actors and program beneficiaries both in Beirut and the Beqaa Valley. See Madeline’s full thesis.
About Madeline:
Madeline Burnham is currently pursuing her master’s in disaster management from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, where she is focused on examining the relationships between shelter, disaster management and migration. She earned her bachelor’s in international studies from Virginia Tech, concentrating in global development, and spent a semester of study at the University of Havana in Cuba. After graduating from Virginia Tech, she worked for three years in Washington, D.C., coordinating and supporting the provision of free legal services to unaccompanied children detained after their arrival in the United States, and also volunteered with the Disaster Action team of the American Red Cross.
Contact:
Reach out to Madeline by email at [email protected] or on LinkedIn.
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During her fellowship, Melina assessed the HLP and tenure security needs of displaced communities and how humanitarian assistance can best respond to these needs; what assistance training and tools are needed; and how the settlements approach can integrate HLP and tenure security. Melina assessed the Venezuelan refugee crisis in Latin America in partnership with the International Organization for Migration, or IOM. In Switzerland, Melina worked with IOM to understand the context of humanitarian assistance, skills and capacities for addressing HLP and tenure security issues, and how improve responses. In Peru, she interviewed Venezuelan migrants and refugees, staff of shelters, and staff and lawyers with Caritas, IOM’s partner providing rental assistance for migrants and refugees. See Melina’s full thesis.
About Melina
Melina Holder has a master’s degree in development practice from UC Berkeley and a bachelor’s degree in city and regional planning and sustainable environments from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. She has worked as an environmental justice public outreach consultant and an environmental land-use planner in local government.Contact
Reach Melina at [email protected] or on LinkedIn.
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A survivor of the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami, Ilham is passionate about disaster risk reduction and post-disaster reconstruction. During his fellowship, he studied the long-term outcomes of post-tsunami housing and livelihood programs in his hometown of Aceh, Indonesia. More than $1.6 billion of aid and tons of natural resources were used to build over 140,000 houses for tsunami survivors. Today, half of these houses have been abandoned and left to decay amid communities in a state of disrepair. The research investigates what led to this unfavorable outcome. See Ilham’s full thesis.
About Ilham:
Ilham Siddiq (he/him/his) is a PhD student in civil systems at the University of Colorado Boulder. He holds bachelor’s degrees in civil engineering and English education, and a master’s degree in civil engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology, where he was a Fulbright scholar. He previously worked at the Tsunami and Disaster Mitigation Research Center in Indonesia and co-developed a climate change mitigation plan which was enacted by the Mayor of Banda Aceh in 2020.
Contact:
Ilham can be reached at [email protected] or on LinkedIn.
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During her fellowship, Jessica worked in multiple regions of Puerto Rico with a team of local students and conducted in-depth field research to understand complex and unique perspectives on intended and unintended implications of post-disaster recovery efforts.
Her thesis results include a categorical framework of the most salient institutional barriers to housing reconstruction, from the perspective of reconstruction stakeholders based in Puerto Rico. These barriers inform a list of recommendations to institutions for a more effective and accessible housing reconstruction process. The recommendations include adaptation of regulation and policy, capacity building and suggestions for improved efficiency. See Jessica’s full thesis.
About Jessica
Jessica received her bachelor’s in civil engineering in 2017 from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. In 2021, she attended Iowa State University, where she earned her integrated master’s and doctorate in civil engineering with a construction emphasis. She also volunteered with the All Hands and Hearts organization to rebuild roofs in Puerto Rico, where she learned about the practical implications of housing recovery programs.
She currently works as a civil engineer for the Federal Emergency Management Agency in the Public Assistance Division, assisting state, local and tribal governments in their infrastructure recovery after disaster throughout the U.S. and its territories. Jessica hopes to remain in the humanitarian and emergency management fields throughout her career, working to improve the translation of policy to effective action.
Contact
Reach Jessica at [email protected] or on LinkedIn.
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Casie’s work investigated household perceptions of shelter safety in a future hazard event and then compared these perceptions to the results of a probabilistic wind assessment of 12 shelter designs. The findings of her work illustrated the importance of providing training on how a shelter operates as a system. See Casie’s full thesis.
About Casie
Casie is currently a risk and resilience consultant with Arup in San Francisco. In her work, she performs both qualitative and quantitative multi-hazard assessments of exiting infrastructure/buildings and sites under consideration for future development. She works with clients to develop mitigation plans to reduce risk to natural and manmade hazards and improve resilience to the impacts of hazard events and climate change. Casie holds a master’s degree and PhD in civil engineering from the University of Colorado Boulder and bachelor’s degrees in civil engineering and in construction engineering and management from Virginia Tech. Her other previous research includes understanding how to improve communication of safe construction practices and how to reduce the barriers to implementing a hurricane-evacuation decision-making tool.
Contact
Email Casie at [email protected]
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Her work included semi-structured interviews with organizations and local government officials, with assistance from local translators. Data from this fellowship supported the development of a report, as well as doctoral research on the humanitarian-development nexus.
About Miriam
Miriam is currently a research program manager at the Water Research Foundation in Alexandria, Virginia. Her areas of focus within the foundation include: utility management, utility workforce, water reuse, decentralized systems and more. Independently, she conducts research on the intersection between housing and access to water and sanitation, more recently including access to public restrooms and services for people experiencing homelessness. Miriam holds a P.h.D., M.S., and B.S. degree in civil engineering from the University of Washington. Other prior experience includes local stormwater permitting and academic research with displaced populations and social implications for onsite water reuse.Contact
LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/miriam-hacker/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/miriamhacker1
Email: [email protected]
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Many of the conclusions and recommendations contained in Anna’s thesis, entitled “Self-recovery in Haiti: a case of reconstructing risk?”, highlight the importance of the first transformative goal of the UN post 2015 development agenda: “Leave no one behind.” Anna concludes that shelter humanitarian assistance and self-recovery direct urban and longer-term development after a disaster, and international humanitarian policies should incorporate such a goal of equitable assistance. Read her thesis summary.
About Anna:
Anna works in Habitat for Humanity’s global program effectiveness team supporting program strategy work as well as providing interim leadership to the global monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning, or MEAL, team. Previously, she was the director of Program Operations in the Asia Pacific region and recently served as interim Poland response director to support housing for refugees fleeing Ukraine. Anna also worked in Haiti for eight years on post-earthquake response, recovery and reconstruction. She completed her two master’s degrees from the University of California Berkeley in architecture and city and regional planning.
Contact
Reach Anna at [email protected] or on LinkedIn.
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Alex’s thesis is entitled, “Addressing the Socio-economic Gaps in Rental Support Programs for Post-Disaster Environments in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and Beirut, Lebanon.” Over the course of nine months, Alex conducted interviews with humanitarians working in the field, academic institutions outside of the U.S. and private sector specialists regarding rental housing markets and the economic conditions needed for more equality in outcomes for renters. His conclusion argues that without a strong link towards social cohesion between renters and non-renters in the host neighborhood as well as a strong livelihood to pay rent, a rental program has a higher probability of failing.
About Alex:
Alex holds a bachelor’s degree in architecture from the University of Oregon and a master’s degree from Oxford Brookes University. He worked in post-earthquake Haiti, post-Typhoon Philippines, South Sudan refugee migration, East-European refugee migration and many other humanitarian responses where shelter and settlement programming was supported. He is currently a shelter and settlements advisor for USAID/BHA where he oversees U.S. funds for international organizations assisting the most vulnerable.
Contact
Email: [email protected]
Phone: +1 (360) 824-0749
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Aaron’s fellowship work investigated household participation across 19 shelter programs to compare different organizational approaches to involve local actors in decision making, facilitate project implementation and evaluate shelter outcomes. This work compiled a set of case studies to document lessons learned from different humanitarian shelter modalities. See Aaron’s full thesis.
About Aaron:
Aaron is currently a lecturer in humanitarian engineering in the School of Civil Engineering at the University of Sydney in Australia where his current research focuses on the interface of infrastructure and social systems regarding disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation. Aaron holds a PhD and master’s degree in civil engineering from the University of Colorado Boulder where he completed his Habitat-USAID/BHA fellowship in the Mortenson Center in global engineering. He also holds a bachelor’s in civil engineering. Previously, Aaron served as a disaster risk reduction and management program officer through Peace Corps Response and has consulted on humanitarian programs.
Contact Aaron:
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaronopdyke/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/aaronopdyke
- Email: [email protected]
