Meet the West Interns

2023 Cohort

"West" Summer Interns 

Diana Baszucki
Communications and Land Use Planning Intern, American Rivers

Diana Baszucki is a rising senior studying history with a focus in the United States. She has also enjoyed completing coursework in the Earth Systems and Creative Writing departments and believes that environmental problems are best solved through an interdisciplinary lens. At American Rivers, she looks forward to working towards river conservation and protection through an approach that honors the human connection to the environment. She grew up in Portola Valley, California.

Hannah Young
Project Analyst Intern, Blue Forest Conservation

Hannah Young is a graduating coterminal master’s student in the Earth Systems Program, with a focus on conservation and land management. She is originally from the Black Hills of South Dakota where her passion for environmental stewardship began. Since then, she has spent the last few years living and working through the Sierra Nevada building on this passion. This summer, Hannah is excited to put her interdisciplinary background to work through the innovative projects at Blue Forest. In her free time, you’ll likely find Hannah on a bike or with her nose in a good book. 

Emily Winn
Source Water Initiative Intern, California Trout

Emily Winn is a member of the Class of 2025 majoring in Environmental Systems Engineering with a focus on energy. She is originally from Denver, Colorado and will be joining California Trout in Mt. Shasta this summer to focus on their Source Water Initiative. Emily is interested in creating sustainable water and energy systems for the 21st century. If not working or hanging out with friends Emily can be found biking, running, or skiing around Colorado or California.

Serena Turner
Intern, Deschutes Land Trust

Serena Turner is a rising junior from Phoenix, Arizona. She is majoring in the neuroscience track of Symbolic Systems and minoring in Earth Systems with a focus on sustainability. Passionate about human-environmental interactions, she wants to make great strides in the realm of sustainability. At Stanford, Serena is an athlete on the varsity beach volleyball team and a member of Cardinal Community. Additionally, this past year she co founded the Stanford chapter of Sprout Up, an environmental education program for 1st and 2nd graders. In her free time, you can find her on an adventure out exploring nature. She cannot wait to learn from and make a difference at the DLT! 

Lucia Quintanar
Hispanic Outreach Intern, Glacier National Park Conservancy

Lucia is a rising junior at Stanford University majoring in Product Design and minoring in Art Study. As a lover of camping and backpacking, she cherishes our natural world for everything it has to offer and hopes to make this space more inclusive and accessible for everyone to experience its wonder. She has worked towards this goal by establishing outdoor education clubs at high schools in the bay, in which students can learn the skills necessary to plan and lead camping trips. She is now very excited to expand this type of inclusion work as the Hispanic Outreach intern at Glacier National Park. In her free time, Lucia enjoys crocheting, sewing, silversmithing, and going to the beach.

Fiona Sandi
Social Media Internship, Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources

Fiona is a senior at Stanford and will graduate with a degree in communication. She is from Miami, Florida and plans to live in Paraguay for two years, working as a volunteer for the Peace Corps. Through prior internship experience and class projects, Fiona has explored the world of video production and digital journalism. She’s very excited to combine content creation with her love for the environment. In her free time, you can find Fiona doing yoga outside, drinking iced coffee at Tresidder, or going on long road trips with her friends.

Eva Jones
Intern, Henry's Fork Foundation

Eva Jones is a rising sophomore studying Environmental Systems Engineering with a focus in freshwater systems. She is also double majoring in Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, studying Queer and Feminist Histories. Eva is from a small town in the Columbia River Gorge in Oregon, which cultivated their interest in restorative, equitable land management. Before working with the Bill Lane Center, they conducted a literature review of Western-Indigenous Co-management within U.S. federal lands in order to find paths of successful managerial relationships and policies to powerfully integrate tribal communities and knowledge into public land management. Eva wants to build nature-based solutions that work with the incredible ingenuity of evolutionary biology to support diverse, healthy communities (human and non-human alike). They are ecstatic to begin this work with the Henry’s Fork Foundation as a Hydrology Intern, assessing and analyzing watershed patterns to predict streamflow responses. In her free time in Ashton, Eva is excited to fish, bike, and play guitar.

Kyla Figuero
Marketing and Development Intern, Heyday Books

Kyla Figueroa is a rising senior at Stanford, majoring in English with an emphasis in creative writing (prose track) and a minor in Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity. At school, she writes for The Stanford Daily and does student theater with various clubs, including restarting Latinos in Theater to center Latino storytelling and artists on campus. Her favorite word “tsundoku,” which is a Japanese term used to describe a person who owns a lot of unread literature because she relates, but she is slowly getting through the shelves. This summer, she will be seeing the behind the scenes of working as Marketing and Development Intern at Heyday. She hopes to learn more about the indie publishing scene in the Bay Area and is excited to work on projects central to her home state. 

Hana Doueiri
Culturally Responsive Curriculum Intern, Kittitas Environmental Education Network (KEEN)

Hana Doueiri is a sophomore studying political science and education at Stanford. She is from Southern California in San Bernardino. She loves gardening and baking. This summer, she will be interning at the Kittitas Environmental Education Network (KEEN) in Ellensburg, Washington. Hana aspires to go into the education field, so she is excited to be spending time with youth while teaching them about the outdoors!

Harry Katz
Elections Intern, National Conference of State Legislatures

Harry Katz is a rising senior at Stanford pursuing a degree in American Studies with a focus on Appalachian and Southern labor history. Originally born in Las Vegas, Harry spent much of his life bouncing around the American West, the Upper South, and New England before finally settling down in rural Ashland, Virginia. Outside of his studies, Harry can be found hiking the Dish, volunteering with the United Farm Workers, or rifling through the free books bench at Margaret Jacks Hall. A passionate scholar of American populism and the Progressive Era, Harry is thrilled to be researching ballot referendums and election security and accessibility with the National Conference of State Legislatures this summer. 

Carly Taylor
Media Arts Intern, Natural History Institute

Carly Taylor is a recent graduate from Cold Spring, Kentucky. She holds a BA in Comparative Literature with a concentration in French, and she is looking forward to serving as the Media Arts Intern for the Natural History Institute in Prescott, Arizona. After growing up exploring the beauty of Appalachia, Carly is excited for this new opportunity to fall in love with Arizona’s Mogollon Highlands region. She hopes to use her content marketing skills and creative vision to help this local nonprofit reach new audiences online and further their mission of integrating the arts, humanities, and sciences. In her free time, Carly writes poetry and fiction and reviews books on her Instagram @unsolicitedbookpics.

Adriana Zhang
Intern, Office of Governor Gavin Newsom

Adrianna Zhang is a rising sophomore pursuing a BA in Public Policy and Urban Studies. Through growing up around grassroots organizing and passionate policy discussions in San Francisco, she developed a passion for writing policy and organizing for social justice. She loves engaging with her community in the San Francisco Bay Area through policy writing and through exploring SF’s best restaurants in her free time. She is excited to intern in Sacramento with the Office of Governor Gavin Newsom. 

Vrinda Suresh
Resilient Landscapes Program Intern, San Francisco Estuary Institute

Vrinda Suresh just completed a coterminal degree in Earth Systems after finishing her undergraduate studies in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Science Communication. She's interested in biodiversity conservation, ecological restoration and stewardship, and working with spatial data. She has done research and projects focusing on niche partitioning of local bat species, and management of invasive plant species. In the next few years, she hopes to work more on spatial analysis in service of local conservation and land management. She’s from the East Bay and in her free time she likes to read, draw, hike, climb, and look at plants. She has a dog named Jelly Bean. 

Amanda Campos
Conservation Outreach Intern, Santa Lucia Conservancy

Amanda Campos (she/her) is a rising sophomore double majoring in the Earth Systems Program and public policy. Born in the iconic city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, she moved to São Paulo when she was 3 years old and then to South Florida when she was 13. Despite growing up amidst gray skyscrapers, she has loved nature since little, gardening and going on nature trips whenever possible. She is eager to participate in the environmental nonprofit world as an intern at the Santa Lucia Conservancy in Carmel-By-The-Sea. Through this opportunity, she wants to learn more about the ecology of central California, increase environmental awareness in the community, and contribute to the protection of biodiversity in the invaluable Santa Lucia Preserve.

Jane Lord-Krause
Intern, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

Jane Lord-Krause is a rising junior from Seattle, Washington. She is double majoring in mathematics and American Studies with a prospective minor in modern languages. She loves reading, hiking, rock climbing, sewing, and eating good food. On campus, Jane works to plan Stanford Powwow and lives in the Native American dorm, Muwekma. She eventually hopes to become a federal lawyer. This summer, she will be interning with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. She is thrilled to have the opportunity to learn about quantitative government work.

Tesfa Madhin
Intern, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

Tesfa Madhin is a rising junior at Stanford pursuing a degree in international relations with a primary specialization in environmental policy. Coming from the Los Angeles area, he has always enjoyed the variety of ecosystems available to explore in his region and is passionate about conservation and mitigating the harmful effects of climate change. He is excited to work with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to help develop solutions to the pressing environmental challenges our society faces. In his free time, Tesfa enjoys going on runs, studying history, and traveling.

Tida Rau
Sustainable Waters Intern, Washington Water Trust

Tida Rau is a rising senior at Stanford University majoring in the Earth Systems Program (with a focus in sustainable food and agriculture) and minoring in public policy. At present, she eagerly awaits the start of her summer internship with Washington Water Trust, an organization dedicated to the protection and restoration of Washington’s waterways. While there, she hopes to develop her ability to communicate with and navigate relevant stakeholders involved in river and stream health. Tida believes this ability will be integral to a career in furthering the food sovereignty of her Indigenous communities. When she’s not engaged in her studies, she can be found crouched down looking for neat rocks; beading; or hiking a trail within the Columbia River Gorge, the place in which she calls home. 

Jayela Lopez
Archeology Program Internship, Yellowstone National Park

Jayela Lopez is a rising senior at Stanford majoring in archaeology and biology. She is from Alexandria, Virginia, but grew up moving around South America. Her interests are in ecological archaeology and the historic cultural relationships between people and their environments. Specifically, she is interested in the archaeology of Latin America and the African Diaspora. She is extremely excited to be interning with Yellowstone National Park in their archaeology program. She can’t wait to visit this national park for the first time and experience archaeological field work. She is also looking forward to getting to meet other university students with similar interests while completing this internship.

Elisabeth Westermann
Museum Intern, Yellowstone National Park

Elisabeth Westermann is a rising sophomore majoring in history and economics. Her academic interests are wide-ranging and include revolutionary and early republican America, the role of student leaders in the Civil Rights Movement, and the history of conservation. She is also interested in engaging broad audiences in history through film and public exhibitions. Outside of class she enjoys reading, writing Arts & Life articles for the Stanford Daily, running, and exploring the Bay Area’s incredible outdoor spaces. She could not be more excited about pursuing historical research and education at the Yellowstone Heritage and Research Center this summer.

Shultz Energy Fellows 

Named in honor of former Secretary of State George P. Shultz, one of the most widely admired American public servants of the past half-century, the program offers a suite of paid, energy-related public service fellowships for Stanford students in California, Colorado, Utah, and Hawaii during the summer. We co-administer this program with the Precourt Institute for Energy, the Haas Center for Public Service, and Stanford in Government. Our 2023 Shultz Fellows and their placements include:

• Jack Rehnborg - Western Interstate Energy Board
• Chloe Romero - California ISO
• Julio Contreras - Western Electricity Coordinating Council
• Ye Zheng - California Department of Water Resources
• Camden Burk - California Energy Commission
• Jillian Anderson - California Public Utilities Commission
• Abhishek Kumar - California Air Resources Board

Read their bios and learn more about the Shultz Fellowship Program here.