Sejal Soni

Sejal... you can call me Sej. 

Ocean-lover, scuba diver, amateur chef, passionate about environmental policy, and inspiring people to care about science and the natural world. 

I grew up in South Africa, the UK, and southeastern Connecticut, USA. I've always been passionate about the ocean and the natural world at large. After my undergraduate education at Tufts University, where I majored in Environmental Studies as well as Geology, I worked in various positions to figure out where I wanted to be. I spent time working in the special education classroom of an elementary school in CT. I lived in South Florida, where I dive-mastered and learned about the scuba diving industry and the surrounding marine ecosystems. I co-founded AweSTEM ebooks to share my love for science and inspire young thinkers. I explored my interest in Astrobiology, but ultimately realized that the natural world and people on this planet were more interesting to me (never mind my lack of prowess in physics and astronomy!).

Grassroots engagement to protect the environment led me to the Fund for the Public Interest. Advocacy and community engagement to protect the environment led me to Save the Harbor / Save the Bay. And finally, public policy grounded in scientific understanding, to protect the environment and human well-being into the future, led me to a Master's of Public Administration in Environmental Science and Policy. This one-year, intensive graduate program at Columbia University gives sustainability professionals the tools to work in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors on implementing environmental policies that are supported by data and beneficial to the amalgam of people that constitutes "the public". While at Columbia, many of my classes and projects focused on various complexities of water. The capstone project that I co-led, A Strategy for Education on the Critical Issues of U.S. Groundwater for Policymakers and Investors, was awarded the Leous/Parry Award for Progressive Sustainability.  

Since completing my degree, I have moved to Seattle, WA and have successfully achieved local Seattleite status by refusing to go up the Space Needle and briefly working as a barista. Currently, I'm working in water infrastructure financing and drinking water safety for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.