Dr. Nievita Bueno Watts is Director of Academic Programs at the Institute of Environmental Health at Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU). She earned a BS degree in Geoscience at the University of Arizona, where she focused on searching for evidence of ice on Mars through analyzing satellite images. At Arizona State University she earned a MS degree in Geoscience, working on EarthScope, a national project to explore the structure and evolution of the North American continent.

Nievita then earned a doctoral degree in Curriculum & Instruction with an emphasis on Science Education at Arizona State University. As a first-generation minority scientist, Dr. Bueno Watts became interested in discovering why there were so few minority students receiving doctorates in the Geosciences. Today Dr. Bueno Watts sits on the Board of Directors of the Geoscience Alliance. This group is dedicated to increasing the number of Native Americans with advanced degrees in the Earth Sciences, broadly defined, as a way to promote sovereignty and self-determination within indigenous nations. Her current research interests include broadening participation in science; community-inspired research; and mitigating the effects of a changing climate on vulnerable populations.

Dr. Diana Dalbotten is the Program Director for the REU on Sustainable Land and Water Resources.  She is the Director of Diversity and Broader Impacts for the St. Anthony Falls Laboratory, University of Minnesota, and for the National Center for Earth-surface Dynamics.  Here work is in the area of diversity and broadening participation in the geosciences.

Diana directs the Geoscience Alliance, a national alliance for broadening participation of Native Americans in the Geosciences.  She also works with colleagues on the gidakiimanaaniwigamig (Our Earth Lodge) Native American math and science camps.