Spatial Design Strategies
For Climate & Conflict-Induced Migration in the Sahel
I served as both a student and Teaching Assistant for Spatial Design Strategies for Climate Migration at Harvard GSD (Spring 2025), a project-based seminar led by Malkit Shoshan investigating climate- and conflict-induced displacement in the Sahel and Mauritania. The course examines how compounding climate disasters—extreme heat, prolonged drought, water stress, food insecurity, sea-level rise, storms, and wildfires—drive migration and demand spatial design responses across scales.
As the TA, I taught and advised students on advanced GIS workflows in ArcGIS Pro, coaching them in reproducible analytical pipelines: assembling multi-source geospatial datasets, performing multi-temporal comparisons, and generating publication-quality cartography. I guided spatial-statistical reasoning, uncertainty-aware visualization of vulnerability projections, and multiscalar narratives connecting regional climate stressors to local patterns of habitation and infrastructure.
A central component of my work involved producing comprehensive climate analyses and climate risk assessment maps for the Sahel region and Mauritania, which served as critical basemaps for the entire class. These foundational maps synthesized climate vulnerability data, projected environmental stressors, and disaster exposure zones, providing a shared spatial framework that enabled other students to layer migration patterns, settlement morphology, resource distribution, and infrastructure networks onto consistent, scientifically grounded climate risk foundations.
The seminar engaged with UN agencies (UNHCR, IOM, UNEP) and local NGOs to understand humanitarian planning realities, while examining how indigenous practices like nomadic pastoralism offer resilience lessons under extreme climatic variability. I facilitated workshops and desk crits combining multi-temporal spatial analysis with design scenario exercises.
Beyond teaching, I finalized the course publication now published by Harvard GSD, curating project submissions, coordinating visual materials, and preparing the manuscript to communicate the seminar's methodologies and findings.