For volunteer and internship-related inquiries, contact DC Coordinator David Krantz, or West Coast Coordinator Laura Driscoll.
Home > CREST Staff and Faculty: Stanford Office
William Durham, Ph.D., CREST's Director at Stanford, is the Bing Professor in Human Biology in the Department of Anthropology, and the Yang and Yamazaki University Fellow. Bill has worked in Peru, Brazil, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, Costa Rica, and Panama, including a year with the Native American Kuna. Together with students, Bill has conducted impact assessments of ecolodges in Costa Rica and Peru. His publications include Scarcity and Survival in Central America (Stanford 1979), The Social Causes of Environmental Destruction in Latin America (U. Michigan Press, 1995, with M. Painter), and Ecotourism and Conservation in the Americas (CABI, 2008, with A. Stronza.) Bill has particular interest in ecotourism as a means to promote conservation and development in Central America, Africa, and Galapagos.
Email: eb.whd@stanford.edu
Laura Driscoll is CREST's Stanford Coordinator, leading the Travelers' Philanthropy program and coordinating research efforts and consulting work out of CREST's west coast office. She graduated from Stanford University in 2007 with both a M.A. and B.A. in Anthropological Sciences. Her master's research examined the cultural effects of ecotourism on indigenous identities in the rain forest region of southeastern Peru. Her current responsibilities outside of managing the Travelers' Philanthropy program, include maintaining websites and printed materials, helping to secure funding through grants and consultancies, guiding the work of research teams in CREST projects abroad, and organizing upcoming conferences and events. She has worked on community development, tourism and travel philanthropy in the U.S., Mexico, Peru, Costa Rica, and Tanzania.
Email: lrd@stanford.edu
Carter Hunt has been a Postdoctoral Fellow in Environmental Anthropology at Stanford University since August 2009. He teaches courses on ecotourism, protected areas, and environmental problems and collaborates on CREST projects. Carter holds a doctorate in Recreation, Park and Tourism Sciences from Texas A&M University and has worked in Guatemala, Ecuador, Peru, Nicaragua and Costa Rica with forms of tourism that support biodiversity conservation, cultural preservation, and sustainable community development. His dissertation research ethnographically examined impacts of rapid coastal tourism development on local rural populations and environments along Nicaragua’s Pacific Coast.
William P. Barnett, Ph.D. is Professor of Strategic Management and Organizational Behavior at Stanford's Graduate School of Business. He studies systems of competition, and how different logics of competition affect the development of organizations. Currently he is studying how certification systems shape competition among ecotourism organizations, and how such competition in turn helps or hinders environmental outcomes.
Email: barnett_william@gsb.stanford.edu
Margaret "Meg" Caldwell, J.D.
is a senior lecturer in Stanford’s Law School, with a joint appointment at the Center for Ocean Solutions, a branch of Stanford’s Woods Institute for the Environment. Meg studies the environmental effects of local land use practices, marine resource policy development and implementation, and developing incentives for conservation. She is assisting CREST with international law and land use policy research in our study of the impacts of coastal tourism development on Costa Rica’s Pacific coast.Email: megc@law.stanford.edu
Rodolfo Dirzo, PhD. is professor of conservation biology in the Department of Biological Sciences at Stanford, with research ongoing in Mexico and Central Amazonia. His work focuses on the implications of global biodiversity loss and human-environment interactions, with a specific emphasis on the importance of preserving ecosystem functions rather than individual species. Most recently, Professor Dirzo contributed to CREST’s research study in July 2009 on the impacts of coastal tourism development on Costa Rica’s Pacific coast.
Email: rdirzo@stanford.edu
Barton ("Buzz") Thompson, J.D./M.B.A., is the Robert E. Paradise Professor of Natural Resources Law and Vice Dean at Stanford Law School and a Senior Scholar at the Institute for International Studies. Co-author of Environmental Law and Policy (Foundation Press, 2003), Buzz's current research focuses on environmental certification programs and the role of non-profit and commercial organizations in the preservation of ecosystems and biodiversity.
Email: buzzt@stanford.edu
Peter Vitousek, Ph.D., is professor of biological sciences and Clifford G. Morrison Professor of Population and Resource Studies. His wide-ranging interests include nutrient cycling, greenhouse gases, and invasions of exotic species. He focuses on linking conservation concerns with the functioning of ecosystems and the workings of the biosphere. He has particular interest in the conservation potential of ecotourism in island ecosystems, especially Hawaii.
Email: vitousek@stanford.edu