BIO
Dr. Mercedes Ward is a design thinker and facilitator who collaborates with individuals and organizations to develop impactful projects, programs, and policies to advance sustainable development. Mercedes believes in the importance of creating enabling environments to support human flourishing – and she is passionate about working with others who are committed to a similar mission. At present, she is doing this work through her role as a research grant development specialist for equity, diversity, and inclusion at the University of Utah.
She accelerated her professional evolution from ecological anthropologist to design thinker when she joined an interdisciplinary, multicultural team to establish a research center for water security in Pakistan. Over a five-year tenure with the USAID-funded U.S.-Pakistan Centers for Advanced Studies in Water, she led a Pakistan-based research team to deliver policy recommendations to improve participatory irrigation management, facilitated workshops to support community-based research and policy impact, and designed and managed quality assurance mechanisms for international education and capacity strengthening programs.
Mercedes recently joined the board of directors of Girls Education International, serving as the Pakistan Project Manager. Previously, she served as a board member for the Utah Fulbright Association and a planning subcommittee member for the 68th United Nations Civil Society Conference. She volunteers as a grant writer for a local nonprofit in Salt Lake City and is eager to support other civil society organizations in the ways she can. She has a PhD and an MS in Anthropology from the University of Utah, and a BS in Biology from the University of the South. In her free time, she likes to read philosophy and write about how to make the world a better place on her blog, Sustainable Development Praxis.
She accelerated her professional evolution from ecological anthropologist to design thinker when she joined an interdisciplinary, multicultural team to establish a research center for water security in Pakistan. Over a five-year tenure with the USAID-funded U.S.-Pakistan Centers for Advanced Studies in Water, she led a Pakistan-based research team to deliver policy recommendations to improve participatory irrigation management, facilitated workshops to support community-based research and policy impact, and designed and managed quality assurance mechanisms for international education and capacity strengthening programs.
Mercedes recently joined the board of directors of Girls Education International, serving as the Pakistan Project Manager. Previously, she served as a board member for the Utah Fulbright Association and a planning subcommittee member for the 68th United Nations Civil Society Conference. She volunteers as a grant writer for a local nonprofit in Salt Lake City and is eager to support other civil society organizations in the ways she can. She has a PhD and an MS in Anthropology from the University of Utah, and a BS in Biology from the University of the South. In her free time, she likes to read philosophy and write about how to make the world a better place on her blog, Sustainable Development Praxis.
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