Center for Latin American and Latinx Studies 
Maria Atuesta was appointed as Data Storytelling and Public Narrative Officer, Namati by The American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) with the ACLS Leading Edge Fellowship Program. She was a Postdoctoral Fellow with the Center for Latin American and Latinx Studies from 2021 to 2022. She has a Ph.D. in Urban Planning from Harvard University and an MA in City and Regional Planning from UC Berkeley. With a background in economics and history, her research explores dynamic relations between space and communities. Specifically, in her dissertation, Maria studied how forced migrants accessed housing in Colombia and how this process has shaped the creation of different neighborhood communities with different claims on the city. With expertise working in policy-oriented projects for multilateral organizations, public offices, and academic research centers, Maria’s research often includes policy analysis. She has studied how different policies have shaped our material and social environments with unintended consequences that have reproduced social inequality. She has been able to advance her research with support from the Fulbright program for Colombia, the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies, and the U.S. Institute of Peace.