2020

Davina P. Durgana, PhD is an award-winning international human rights statistician who has developed leading global models to assess risk and vulnerability to modern slavery. Durgana is a report co-author and Senior Statistician on the Global Slavery Index of the Minderoo Foundation’s Walk Free Initiative.

She is the American Statistical Association’s 2016 Statistical Advocate of the Year, a committee member of Statistics without Borders, and a Forbes Top 30 Under 30 in Science for 2017 for her work on statistical modeling, human security theory, and human trafficking. Durgana has also recently been announced as an inaugural IF/Then Ambassador working to encourage women to pursue STEM fields with the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Durgana is Assistant Professor of Sustainable Development at SIT Graduate Institute in D.C. where she served as Lead Faculty on the Inclusive and Human Security Graduate Certificate program with the Institute for Inclusive Security. Durgana was selected as a Google Fellow for Technology and Social Change for her work in Human Trafficking and Technology.

She was also awarded with the Trafficking in America Task Force Award for Service for her contributions to the Anti-Trafficking Field in the United States and was named as a Disruption Awards Foundation Fellow for 2018. She serves on several expert groups for the United Nations, the Department of Justice, and the National Science Foundation.

In 2015 she received the University Award for Outstanding Scholarship at the Graduate Level from American University where she received her PhD in International Relations with Distinction. She received her Master’s degrees in Paris, France while studying human trafficking at the Sorbonne and the American University of Paris, and her Bachelor’s degree at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.

Wesley Cuadrado-Casllo, nished his bachelors in Mechanical Engineering at University of Puerto Rico-Mayagüez (UPRM) in December 2011. On January 2012, Wesley started his master’s of science in Mechanical Engineering with a focus in Materials Science and Engineering. Wesley’s master’s studies and research was sponsored by the Center for Education and Training in Agriculture and Related Sciences (CETARS), a United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) funded program at the UPRM.

His master’s thesis research topic was on sintered tanium dioxide (TiO2) / recycled glass composites designed for potenal degradaon of waterborne pollutants. In 2013, Wesley had the opportunity to parcipate at the Emerging Researchers Naonal (ERN) Conference where he presented his research poster tled: Percolaon in Recycled Glass Designed for Polluted Soil Filtering. During this academic and professional experience, he was able to interact with dierent professionals in the eld of science and engineering that were able to provide enriching feedback and quesons regarding the topic.

Currently, Wesley is a fourth-year PhD candidate at the University of Florida (UF) working on the design of lightweight Magnesium (Mg) alloy sheets designed for car door panels. This project is supervised by Michele V. Manuel, professor and chair of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at UF. This current research project is focused on the study and improvements of Mg formability by addions of Calcium (Ca) and Zinc (Zn) solutes and throughout thermo-mechanical processing.  This project is part of the United Stated Automove Materials Partnership (USAMP) LLC and is funded by the Department of Energy (DOE).