Conservation Futures
Academy
Learning Ecosystem
The Conservation Futures Academy is more than a set of courses—it’s a learning ecosystem shaped through research, strategy, and design to prepare conservation leaders for complex real-world challenges. This page captures my role in defining CFA’s experience strategy, connecting the portfolio, and continuously improving offerings based on learner and partner insight.
Welcome to ASU’s New School of Conservation Futures
Experience Strategy
Define the vision, learning strategy, and experience roadmap across the Conservation Futures Academy portfolio.
Learning Architecture
Design scalable hybrid learning experiences that connect asynchronous learning, live cohorts, and applied practice.
Research-Informed Design
Use learner, faculty, partner, and market insights to shape and continuously evolve the learning ecosystem.
Cross-Functional Leadership
Lead instructional designers, videographers, project managers, consultants, and university partners from concept through delivery.
Faculty & SME Co-Design
Facilitate collaborative design sessions that transform subject-matter expertise into engaging, learner-centered experiences.
Continuous Improvement
Partner with product, marketing, and impact teams to refine offerings through learner feedback, data, and iteration.
My scope includes…
Designing the CFA Learning Ecosystem
As Lead, Learning Experience Design, I steward the CFA learning ecosystem across all current and future non-credit offerings—work that supports a $115M, university-defining investment for the Rob Walton School of Conservation Futures. My role spans research, strategy, architecture, facilitation, and continuous improvement—ensuring every offering fits within a cohesive ecosystem while evolving through learner feedback, faculty collaboration, partner insights, and market needs.
Design principles that guide my work include…
Action-oriented learning with real-world deliverables and applied toolkits
Partner-powered curriculum co-created with faculty, practitioners, and industry leaders
Future-forward content aligned to emerging conservation needs
Cohort-based experiences that prioritize peer learning and shared reflection
These principles aren't static design goals—they're continually refined through collaboration with faculty, learner feedback, partner perspectives, and iterative evaluation. My role is to translate those insights into a learning ecosystem that feels cohesive, adaptable, and responsive as the portfolio grows.
Leading Learning Experience Design
CFA learning experiences are designed to move beyond theory and into practice. Across all offerings, the focus is on helping learners apply new skills, tools, and frameworks directly to their professional contexts—whether advancing conservation leadership, technology adoption, ethical partnerships, or organizational strategy.
Every new learning experience begins with discovery. I work with faculty, learners, partners, and cross-functional teams to understand goals, identify opportunities, and surface insights before translating them into scalable learning experiences. This research-informed process ensures every offering balances academic rigor, practical relevance, and an engaging learner experience.
Designing for Conservation Community
At the heart of CFA’s hybrid offerings is a deliberate focus on community. The learning experiences are designed not just as courses, but as shared spaces where conservation professionals can learn with and from one another while building relationships that extend beyond a single cohort. The community experience continues to evolve through facilitator observations, learner feedback, and ongoing reflection across each cohort.
Each offering blends multiple modes of engagement to support this community-building:
Expert-led asynchronous content and guest speakers that ground learning in current conservation practice and emerging trends
Live cohort sessions that emphasize applied breakouts, shared problem-solving, and peer exchange
Ongoing community spaces—including Slack channels, discussion boards, and focus groups—where learners continue conversations, share resources, and support one another between sessions
Co-created artifacts and capstones, where learners collaboratively surface insights and build toolkits they can carry back into their organizations
The experience intentionally creates repeated opportunities for learners to practice skills together, reflect openly, and learn across roles, regions, and sectors. Final showcase sessions highlight this collective work, giving participants space to share capstones, leadership toolkits, and applied strategies while strengthening professional networks within the cohort.
This approach allows CFA to function as more than a set of courses. It creates a learning community for conservation professionals—one that supports upskilling in real work contexts while fostering connection, accountability, and a shared sense of purpose as the ecosystem continues to grow.
CFA in Practice
CFA’s design principles come to life across a growing portfolio of hybrid offerings. Each course is built around the same core architecture—applied learning, cohort connection, and real-world relevance—while addressing distinct challenges conservation professionals face at different points in their careers.
Rather than treating these as standalone courses, I design them as interconnected experiences that collectively support leadership development, technical fluency, ethical collaboration, and strategic decision-making.
Together, these offerings reflect a shared commitment to applied learning, peer exchange, and community building—while allowing each course to serve a distinct purpose within the broader CFA ecosystem.
Check out the first CFA learning experiences I’ve designed:
Develops adaptive leadership and systems thinking for conservation professionals navigating complexity, uncertainty, and change. Learners engage in cohort-based problem solving and build a leadership toolkit grounded in real challenges from their work.
Builds practical fluency with emerging technologies shaping modern conservation practice. Through applied activities and expert-led learning, participants explore how data, AI, and spatial tools can inform smarter, more effective conservation decisions.
Centers ethical partnership, reciprocity, and Indigenous knowledge systems in conservation work. Learners engage with practitioners and case studies that challenge extractive models and emphasize relationship-based, community-embedded approaches.
Supports professionals working at the intersection of conservation and organizations. Learners explore how conservation principles can be embedded into governance, operations, and strategic decision-making across sectors.
Operating and Scaling the System
Scaling CFA requires more than delivering courses—it requires designing systems that connect people, processes, and continuous learning across the portfolio.
Lead weekly build sessions with faculty and subject-matter experts to co-create content and align learning outcomes
Ensure live sessions, asynchronous modules, and capstones reinforce one another across courses
Maintain shared design standards so offerings feel cohesive while remaining context-specific
Design & Build Cadence
Oversee instructional designers, videographers, project managers, and consultant partners
Establish facilitation playbooks, design templates, and quality benchmarks
Support facilitator readiness and consistency across cohort runs
Team Leadership & Enablement
Partner with marketing and product teams to align learning design with audience needs and positioning
Collaborate with partnerships and guest experts to integrate real-world perspectives
Coordinate with impact and analytics teams to define and track meaningful outcomes
Cross-Functional Collaboration
Use learner interviews, focus groups, facilitator observations, and learning analytics to continuously refine the experience
Review enrollment, completion, and satisfaction data across course runs
Refine experiences over time to support both scale and learner experience
Iteration & Quality Assurance
Impact and What’s Next
The Conservation Futures Academy represents a long-term investment in how conservation professionals learn, connect, and lead. The current portfolio of hybrid offerings establishes a shared learning foundation—one that combines applied skill-building, peer community, and real-world relevance.
As CFA continues to grow, this learning system will expand to include additional credentials, pathways, and executive experiences—while remaining grounded in the same community-centered design principles. My role is to continue stewarding the ecosystem through research, collaboration, and iterative design—ensuring new offerings integrate seamlessly while continuing to evolve with learner and partner needs.