Alumni Conversation

Columbia GSAPP students are invited to join a group of alumni professionals to learn about their work and professional paths. This conversation is part of the AlumnI Conversations program, a series of informal one hour conversations for current students in a small group format. This event is primarily for current PhD students and is moderated by Mauren Abi Ghanem and Stefan Norgaard.

This event will be hosted virtually. RSVP to gsappalumni@columbia.edu.

PARTICIPANTS

Adèle Cassola ‘18 PhD, Urban Planning
Adèle Cassola is the Research Director of the Public Health Institutions research stream at York University’s Global Strategy Lab. Adèle completed her Ph.D. in Urban Planning at Columbia University, where her mixed-methods dissertation drew on original survey and interview data to analyze how political, economic, and institutional factors influence the adoption and implementation of equitable development policies. Adèle also holds a B.A. in Peace and Conflict Studies from the University of Toronto and an M.Sc. in City Design and Social Science from the London School of Economics. Adèle previously worked with the Institute for Health and Social Policy, the World Policy Analysis Centre, the Centre for Research on Inner City Health, and New York City’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development.

Dory Thrasher '15 PhD, Urban Planning
Dory Thrasher is a City Research Scientist at the NYC Department of Social Services, where she conducts program evaluations, complies research, and crunches census data. She is also serves on the board of the New York Abortion Access Fund as a data co-managers. She completed her PhD in Urban Planning at Columbia in 2015.

Lauren Fischer '19 PhD, Urban Planning
Lauren Ames Fischer is an assistant professor in urban policy and planning at the University of North Texas. Dr. Fischer is a scholar of land use and transportation planning whose work examines how local policies and practices affect environmental sustainability, racial segregation, and spatial equity. Her research has been funded by the Lincoln Institute for Land Policy, the Environmental Defense Fund, and the National Science Foundation and has appeared in both academic journals and local media outlets. Dr. Fischer earned her Ph.D. in urban planning from Columbia University in 2019 where she also completed a National Science Foundation traineeship in the Fu Foundation School of Engineering.

Eric Goldwyn '17 PhD, Urban Planning
Eric is an Assistant Professor and Program Director at NYU Marron. He leads the Transportation and Land-Use program. Currently, they are investigating the cost drivers of transit-infrastructure projects and will begin new projects on high-speed along the Northeast Corridor and the land-use impacts of the proposed Interborough Express rail project in Brooklyn and Queens.

Shagun Mehrotra '12 PhD, Urban Planning
Shagun Mehrotra is a Senior Advisor at World Resources Institute. Over the last two decades, he has led teams focused on solutions for climate change, cities, infrastructure—transport, water, and energy. Prior to joining WRI, Shagun was a Senior Urban Specialist at the World Bank where he led work on sustainable cities. Previously, he was an Assistant Professor of Sustainable Development at The New School, New York and a faculty fellow at Columbia University. Through his policy and investment work, research, and teaching he has engaged and partnered with governments, the private sector, and community organizations in the Americas, Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. He served on the IPCC as a Lead Author for the special report on impacts of 1.5 degree warming and has published books on climate change and cities with Cambridge University Press and on infrastructure economics with Oxford University Press. His work has been featured in Nature and Scientific American. Shagun holds a PhD in Urban Planning and a Master’s in International Affairs from Columbia University. He has a Master of Science in Urban Environmental Management from the Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkok and a Bachelor’s degree in Architecture from CEPT University, Ahmedabad, India.

Organized by Columbia GSAPP’s Office of Development and Alumni Relations.