Board Bios

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Ana Luz Porzecanski, Director of Education
Dr. Ana Luz Porzecanski is Assistant Director for Capacity Development and NCEP Coordinator for the Americas at the Center for Biodiversity and Conservation. Since 2003, she has been helping design and implement professional development opportunities and teaching materials for university professors and conservation professionals in Latin and North America through the activities of the Network of Conservation Educators and Practioners. She also coordinates the International Graduate Student Fellowship Program and provides logistical and academic support for the Center's graduate fellows. Ana Luz teaches courses in conservation biology and evolution at Columbia University, where she is an adjunct faculty member of the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Biology. She obtained her undergraduate degree in biological sciences from the Universidad de la República, Uruguay, and her Ph.D. from Columbia University in 2003, where she carried out research on the systematics and historical biogeography of South American aridland birds, as well as on international environmental policy issues.

Anthony Giordano, Chief Financial Officer
I formally began my professional career by achieving a B.Sc. in Biology (Zoology) and a B.Sc. in Environmental Science (Biology) at Long Island University in 1994. After working both domestically and abroad for several years, I entered graduate school at the University of Maryland/ Frostburg State, where I went on to obtain a M.Sc. in Conservation Biology.

Since achieving my double B.Sc., I have worked extensively in the overlapping and related fields/ specialties of conservation biology, tropical ecology, wildlife ecology, and mammalogy. Much of this work has occurred in the neotropics of Latin America, including countries such as Mexico, Belize, Costa Rica, French Guiana, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, and Paraguay. Many of these projects have involved the conservation of carnivores, particularly jaguars (conflict resolution, ecology, landscape genetics, large-scale conservation planning) through S.P.E.C.I.E.S., a division of an international nonprofit conservation organization called LifeScape International that I founded in 2004. Although largely out of the spotlight due to our desire to spend all funds raised on program/ project activities, SPECIES projects have developed rapidly over the past 3 years (2008-2011) in countries such as Mexico, Paraguay, Brazil, Chile, Bolivia, and Argentina, primarily through our Jaguar Conservation & Research Program. However, additional projects we now have across the Chaco Ecoregion include one focusing on maned wolf distribution and occupancy in Paraguay, as well as the 2nd project of our new Eleventh Hour program (for Critically Endangered Species) which is focused on tagua conservation, the first such project targeting this species in > 20 years.

Currently, I am also a Ph.D. candidate at Texas Tech University, and Fulbright Scholar in Paraguay (2011), working on developing a regional conservation strategy for jaguars across the Chaco. I am living in Paraguay this year, and this has allowed me the flexibility to not only pursue my dissertation research on regional jaguar landscape genetics and ecology, but help implement five new conservation projects through our NGO. Together, these projects will impact no less than four different countries.

I have been a member of the Society for Conservation Biology since 1997. I am also a member of the American Society of Mammalogist's Conservation Committee, as well as a member of the Association of Tropical Biology. I have been looking to play an increasingly more active role in the SCB, and in 2007 I founded the Texas Tech University Chapter of SCB. After some initial setbacks in America's most conservative county (Lubbock, TX), the TTU-SCB Chapter is now fully functional, and I am proud to say operates under the leadership of some of the most promising of the University's wildlife and conservation students. Recently, I have thought that perhaps my research and applied conservation experience would be best suited for a position on the ANA Board. I believe that for all SCB has provided to me, both as a student and a practicing professional over the past 15 years, it is long overdue that I give something back to it.

Carlos Roberto Chavarría, Director of Nominations
Carlos Roberto Chavarría has been working on conservation and community development based on the sustainable use of natural resources, since 1984, when he started studying at the Costa Rican Technological Institute, where he obtained a Forestry degree. Later, he obtained a postgraduate degree on Protected Areas Management from Colorado State University (USA) and another one on Sustanaible Tourism from the Universidad Nacional (Costa Rica).

Carlos has been involved with ecotourism and rural tourism, in connection with protected areas, through the development of management plans and design of biological corridors, as a way to involve local communities into conservation, in Tortuguero, Talamanca, Siquirres and Sarapiquí (Costa Rica).

Today, Carlos is the Executive Director of Tirimbina Rainforest Center, a NGO that promotes conservation, research and education, and that has become a model about sustainability. Carlos has also been serving as a member of the Board of Director of the National Chamber of Tourism (Canatur) from 2004 to 2006, and has been serving as the President of the Sarapiquí Chamber of Tourism (Catusa) since 2003.

Carolina García Lino, Secretary
Carolina García Lino is a Botany PhD student at Concepción University, Chile. Her research involves plant ecology in the high Andes of central Chile. She obtained her undergraduate degree in Biology from San Andres University, La Paz, Bolivia. She is collaborating in the GLORIA project, monitoring the influence of climate change on vegetation in Sajama and Apolobamba in Bolivia and she was coordinator of the Conservation of Polylepis forest project that was carried out together with local communities. She is member of the Bolivian Chapter of which she served as President from 2006 to 2008.

Clinton N. Jenkins, Ex-oficio
Clinton Jenkins is a Research Scholar in the Biology Department at North Carolina State University. He received his Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from the University of Tennessee in 2002. Clinton specializes in using spatial analysis and remote-sensing technologies to answer conservation questions and identify priorities for action. This research has taken him to the Brazilian Atlantic Forests, Florida Everglades, southwestern China, Central America, and the Amazon. In each of these places, there are pressing conservation issues involving threats to biodiversity from human development. By identifying the location and causes of those threats, Clinton tries to focus conservation efforts on key places, and suggest alternatives to current development patterns so that biodiversity might survive alongside humanity. He also trains conservation professionals in conservation GIS and advanced spatial analysis at the Instituto de Pesquisas Ecológicas (IPÊ) in Brazil.

Mariana M. Vale, President
Dr. Mariana M. Vale is Brazilian. She earned her Ph.D. from Duke University, USA, in 2007 and is now Associate Professor at the Ecology Department of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Her research revolves around biodiversity conservation in the Neotropics, using geographic information systems to identify priority areas and taxa for conservation in the present and in climate change scenarios, focusing on birds and mammals in forested environments. She has been part of the ANA Board since 2007, first as Director of Communication and now as the section’s President. Her CV is available at:
http://lattes.cnpq.br/4397811809588252

Olivier Chassot, Director of Communication
Dr. Olivier Chassot is Director of Science at the Tropical Science Center (Costa Rica), Co-Director of the Great Green Macaw Research and Conservation Project, Co-Coordinator of the Executive Committee of the San Juan-La Selva Biological Corridor, Coordinator of the Mesoamerican Parrot Conservation Network, Chairman of the Mesoamerican Society for Conservation Biology, Deputy Vice-Chair for Connectivity Conservation at the Mountains Biome of the World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA) – IUCN, Vice-Chair for Mesoamerica at the Transboundary Specialist Group of the World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA) – IUCN, Director of Communications for the Austral and Neotropical America Section of the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB), and is also an active member of the World Commission on Ecosystem Management (CEM-IUCN). He has been Dean of Environment and Sustainable Development and Director of the Latin American School for Protected Areas (ELAP) at the University for International Cooperation (UCI) in Costa Rica, from 2009 to 2010. Olivier Chassot has received a Bachelors in Arts (Université de Lausanne), a Masters in Project Management (University for International Cooperation), and a PhD in Natural Sciences for Sustainable Development (Universidad Nacional de Costa Rica / Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica / Universidad Nacional a Distancia / Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México). Olivier Chassot has an extensive knowledge in sustainability topics; he has developed a wide experience in designing, fundraising and implementing conservation biology programs, biological corridors, leadership of inter-institutional alliances at the national, bi-national and regional level, as well as in the creation of protected areas. He is a dynamic and passionate conservation practitioner, highly motivated, constantly seeking to self improve, compromised with high standards of personal and professional excellence, always eager to learn and able to build strong intercultural relationships. Olivier is the author or co-author of 92 publications and 111 presentations at international conferences and workshops (Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, France, Germany, Ecuador, Peru, Belize, Puerto Rico, Brazil, Honduras, Panama, Spain, Mexico, Guatemala, the United States, Colombia, Korea, Cuba and Monaco) abd has coordinated 62 national and regional events (Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Cuba, Mexico and Belize).

Rurik List, President Elect
Rurik is the head of the Department of Environmental Sciences at the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Lerma. He is a Mexican carnivore and conservation biologist. His work focuses on research and implementation of actions that advance the conservation of carnivores, threatened species and their habitats. He has a special interest in species’ reintroduction, and in the identification and protection of biologically important areas. An important part of his activities are on outreach about his work subjects and areas, and about Nature conservation issues in general. Most of his career has taken place in grasslands and temperate forests. He has been involved in research or in conservation efforts with species like the black-footed ferret, wolf, kit and gray foxes, coyote, bison, ringtail and jaguar.

Sandra Pompa Mansilla, Director of Communications Ex-oficio
Since I can remember nature has been my research subject, passion and inspiration. Always eager to leave the big city and swim in the ocean or run in a forest. That’s me. As a child I dreamt with knowing places where few people go and many just imagine, saving species, contribute actively in my community and planet. I had no doubt in choosing biology as my career and way of life; I received precious tools and invaluable knowledge in my academic formation. Dreams began to come true and the wish list began to grow. Seeking the active contribution to several researchers’ projects I experienced from amazing birdsongs in tropical forests to the silent charming landscapes of the desert, whales breaching with breathtaking sunsets in islands far away, imposing great white sharks swimming right across my eyes, and the jaw dropping tree to tree leap of a wild jaguar. Without knowing, I had already become an active researcher with the sole aim of conserving our natural resources.

Today, I have led the environmental program at a school, I’m a PhD candidate, I have taught the lecture Bioconservación for several times in the masters and PhD degree program at UNAM. I have been actively contributing to the Society for Conservation Biology since 2007 and was director of communications of the ANA section 2009-2011. I have several chapters in books as well as a couple of indexed publications. I have done research internships at the Environmental Research Division at NOAA in California, collaborated on the SPLASH1 project in 2004-2006; I also collaborate with Fondo Mexicano para la Conservación in evaluating sustainable projects within natural protected areas. EcoTips, an ecofriendly webpage with green tips was created along with Dr. Ceballos. I’ve attended 6 international congresses/meetings addressing conservation issues; have been interviewed for radio and newspaper encouraging sustainability and a green way of life.