Amanda Labrado, a geological sciences doctoral student at The University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), was named a Congressional Science Fellow by the Geological Society of America and the U.S. Geological Survey. She will spend a year working for a member of Congress or a congressional committee from September 2021 through August 2022.
“I am very honored to have been offered this opportunity,” Labrado told UTEP Communications. “I am looking forward to learning how scientists can engage in the policymaking process. I am incredibly thankful for all the wonderful people at UTEP who helped me to get to this point in my life.”
The award recognizes that Ms. Labrado is at the top of her field, said James Kubicki, chair of UTEP’s Department of Earth, Environmental and Resource Sciences in a statement. “She will have an opportunity to inform and influence the U.S. government regarding critical issues that face our nation regarding geosciences.”
Labrado was awarded the Diana Natalicio Dissertation Research Fellowship for 2020-21 to support her last year of dissertation work at UTEP.
“Dr. Natalicio was UTEP’s first female president and helped shape UTEP into the amazing minority-serving, R1 research institution it is now,” Labrado told UTEP Communications in July 2020. “For me, it means being part of the legacy she left behind. I was able to shake her hand when I received my undergraduate degree, and although I will not be able to do so for my doctoral degree, I am so happy to graduate as a Natalicio fellow.”
Currently, Natalicio is on the board of directors for the Hispanic Scholarship Fund. She is a principal investigator in a National Science Foundation program to increase participation in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM fields.
In 2012, Labrado received a bachelor’s degree in environmental science with a concentration in geology from UTEP, followed by a master’s in geosciences with a minor in biogeochemistry from Pennsylvania State University in 2017.
“Every day legislation is passed that affects our planet and the way everyone interacts with the natural world around them,” Labrado told UTEP Communications. “My research interests lay at the intersection between abiotic and biotic processes or living and nonliving things. Just like my research interests, I want to work at the intersection between government and science. Helping our politicians understand how we can create and enforce protecting our planet’s natural systems is vital to our species’ continued success.” (UTEP campus photo courtesy of Dicklyon, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)
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