I was born in Virginia and grew up in the Washington, DC metro area, attending Mary Washington College in Fredericksburg, Virginia. While at Mary Washington I began my work on the Garifuna communities in Belize, defending my honors thesis and graduating magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Geography in 2001.

Over the course of the next three years, I was employed in the Species Conservation Division of Defenders of Wildlife in Washington, DC.

In August 2004, I entered graduate school at the University of Texas at Austin to begin work on a master’s degree in the Department of Geography and the Environment with a focus on cultural geography, specifically the construction, representation and performance of race and ethnicity. I continued my work on the Garifuna, culminating with my thesis, Reconstructing Identity: Representational Strategies in the Garifuna Community of Dangriga, Belize.

Currently, I am continuing my work in the Department of Geography and the Environment at the University of Texas. I am currently researching jaguar conservation in the U.S./Mexico borderlands, while also studying for my certificate in Nonprofit and Philanthropic Studies.

In my free time, I enjoy  traveling, film, and volunteering with animal rescue groups.  As an undergraduate, I rode on the varisty equestrian team at Mary Washington College, and in 2009 I coached the equestrian team for Texas State University.