Dr. Leah Vanwey

Biography

Leah VanWey currently serves as a Professor and Dean at Brown University. She is a social demographer and environmental social scientist whose recent research has focused on household responses to payment for reforestation programs in the Atlantic Forest of Brazil, as well as the social and environmental impacts of these programs. Her commitment to interdisciplinary research has led her to collaborate with anthropologists, geographers, demographers, sociologists, urban planners, historians, geoscientists, and ecologists. Before her current role, Professor VanWey served as the Senior Deputy Director of the Institute for Environment and Society at Brown, as well as the Associate Director for the Population Studies and Training Center and the Associate Provost for Academic Space. She received her PhD from the University of North Carolina and has taught at Indiana University. Her research also includes studying the dynamics of frontier settlement and land use in the Brazilian Amazon, advocating for the protection of environmental resources while promoting equitable social and economic development. Professor VanWey teaches courses related to human-environment interactions, research design, and data analysis, including undergraduate, masters, and PhD-level courses.

Research Interests

Courses