We’re very excited to welcome the Fifth Batch of students to the NFLC. Please be sure to check out the home page to see the latest reflections from this most recent batch of students.

Meet the Cornell students who are spending Spring 2020 in Kotagiri:

Zoe Barr is a junior studying Environment & Sustainability, and International Agriculture and Rural Development at Cornell University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Zoe’s research interests include investigating how a variety of ecosystem services can more adequately be valued and incorporated into PES schemes in an effort to better benefit smallholder land owners, as well as how agroforestry systems can be included in these schemes to promote a conservationist rather than preservationist approach to landscape-based climate change mitigation. Zoe has spent time in Ecuador assisting in research regarding the impact of carbon commodification schemes, such as the UN REDD+ initiatives, on farmers practicing cacao agroforestry in the Amazon Basin. Zoe is looking forward to the learning about and researching the impacts that forestry laws have on peoples in the context of the Nilgiris, and how indigenous land rights can better be incorporated into these laws.

Hailey Shapiro is a sophomore at Cornell University studying Government and International Relations.  She is interested in how governmental policies can improve people’s well-being.  At Cornell, much of Hailey’s work is in the field of criminal justice.  She works as a teaching assistant for an English class for incarcerated men and mentors students in a youth detention facility.  She also works with a non-profit organization that sends educational materials to prisons around the country.  Hailey is excited to learn more about the Nilgiris and participate in research through the NFLC program.