2025-26 AY PT Research Fellowship: Urban Growth in the Colombian Amazon
The Stanford King Center on Global Development’s Academic Year Part-Time Research Fellowship Program connects King Center faculty affiliates and affiliated researchers with undergraduate students committed to providing research support during autumn, winter, and spring quarters.
Students have the opportunity to engage in world-class research that has real-world impact. Undergraduate student research fellows are paid $19/hour*. Students must be enrolled full-time to participate and must be able to commit to research 8-10 hours per week.
*Students must attend orientation and submit an I-9 form to verify employment and receive payment.
Research Project Description:
Amazonian cities are expanding rapidly, transforming landscapes long shaped by Indigenous stewardship. This urban growth alters ecological interactions, particularly between humans, wildlife, and disease vectors, while also reshaping cultural and social dynamics. Despite these profound changes, urbanization in the Amazon remains understudied compared to deforestation or conservation in forest areas. This project investigates how urban expansion in Leticia, Colombia—a tri-border Amazonian city—affects ecology, human–wildlife interactions, and the emergence of mosquito-borne diseases. Combining ecological fieldwork and participatory methods with local communities, the project seeks to document how construction types, neighborhood patterns, and local knowledge influence both environmental and public health outcomes. By centering community-driven perspectives, the research aims to generate more equitable frameworks for sustainable Amazonian urban futures.
Primary Research Mentor: Valeria Ramirez Castaneda, Postdoctoral Research Fellow - King Center on Global Development
- Literature review: Summarize articles on Amazonian urbanization, ecology, and vector-borne diseases.
- Archival research: Organize photographs, maps, and policy documents.
- Data organization & analysis: Enter, clean, and manage ecological and survey data; Run descriptive statistics and generate charts in Excel or R.
- Communications: Draft outreach content for partners, grants, permits, and public platforms; Prepare interview questions, consent forms, and workshop materials.
- Lab work: Assist with DNA extraction and PCR analysis.
Stanford undergraduate students in good academic standing and enrolled full-time are eligible to apply. Co-term students must have undergraduate student status; if co-terms are in graduate billing status (after 12 quarters) they are ineligible to participate.
All majors are welcome!
Students Responsibilities:
- Work with our team to develop, test, and iteratively improve AI-algorithms to identify trash sites in high-resolution drone imaging.
Students qualifications:
- Fluent in Spanish language including writing and reading (mandatory)
- Basic R skills (optional)Computer science background with experience coding in R and Python.
Time Commitment:
The time commitment is 8-10 hours per week (equivalent to a 3-unit course) each academic quarter. The expectation is that students will work the full academic year with their mentor (Autumn, Winter, and Spring quarters). Students planning on studying abroad are not eligible.
To Apply:
Along with the application, applicants are asked to submit:
- a cover letter
- resume or CV
- unofficial Stanford transcript (first quarter frosh do not need to submit transcripts for autumn quarter applications)
Research Mentor Questions for Applicants: Do you have experience with any of the following, if so please describe:
- What languages do you know besides English and what is your proficiency?
- Have you visited the Amazon rainforest? How was you trip? If you haven't, how do you imagine Amazonian cities?
