Speakers
The Climate Change Conference will include a keynote presentation and a panel discussion featuring experts offering diverse perspectives on climate-driven migration.
Panelists
Shelly Culbertson
Senior Policy Researcher at the RAND Corporation
Shelly Culbertson is a senior policy researcher at the RAND Corporation and an associate director of the Disaster Management & Resilience Program (DMR), part of the RAND Homeland Security Research Division. She focuses on disaster and post-conflict recovery, forced displacement, international development, and education. She has led multiple studies about refugees, with a particular focus on education, jobs, humanitarian assistance models, return conditions, and technology, and she co-leads RAND’s Mass Migration Strategy Group.
Culbertson led a hurricane recovery implementation plan for the U.S. Virgin Islands, sponsored by FEMA; a study on municipal recovery capacities needed for Puerto Rico; and a study on post-conflict stabilization of Mosul, Iraq, after the operations against ISIS. Her international development work has focused on the Middle East. She co-led a multi-year effort to advise the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraq on improving education and coordinated RAND’s project to design programs for the Qatar National Research Fund, which has now awarded over a billion dollars in research grants.
Before RAND, Culbertson worked at the U.S. State Department in Turkey and at LMI Government Consulting. Her commentaries have appeared in publications including Foreign Policy, The National Interest, The Hill, Foreign Affairs, and Newsweek, and she has conducted interviews on MSNBC, NPR, and BBC World. Culbertson is the author of The Fires of Spring: A Post Arab Spring Journey Through the Turbulent New Middle East (St. Martin’s Press). She earned her MPA in public policy and international development from the School for Public and International Affairs, Princeton University.
Yves Umuhoza
Chief Executive Officer and Chief Engineer at AEI, Climate and Refugee Education Advocate
Yves Umuhoza is a Burundian refugee with a passion for climate advocacy and refugee education. He has participated in high-profile international conferences, including COP26 (United Nations Climate Change Conference 2021), the Refugee Migrant and Education Network (RMEN) Conference, Rewired Summit Dubai 2022, and World Higher Education Conference (WHEC2022) Barcelona 2022.
Umhoza founded a refugee-youth-led organization in Zimbabwe called Assorted Energies International (AEI). Previously, he managed a project in Tongogara Refugee Camp that received funding from the Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) through the Global Refugee Youth Network (GRYN). He also volunteered with UNHCR Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene.
Umuhoza is a member of the Global Refugee Education Council 2022/2023 under World Vision Canada. He is an alum of the Albert Einstein German Academic Refugee Initiative (DAFI) scholarship program and is currently pursuing a master’s degree in energy and nuclear engineering in Politecnico di Torino in Italy.
Fr. Tom Smolich, SJ
International Director of the Jesuit Refugee Service
Father Thomas H. Smolich, SJ, has served as the international director of the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) since October 2015. A native of Sacramento, he was ordained a Jesuit priest in 1986. He earned a master of divinity from the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley and an MBA from Stanford University.
Fr. Smolich’s priestly ministry has focused on community development. While stationed at Dolores Mission Parish in East Los Angeles, he served as Executive Director of Proyecto Pastoral, a faith-based NGO coordinating community development activity in the parish. After business school, he was a project manager at Mid-Peninsula Housing Coalition, an affordable housing developer in Redwood City.
In 1999, Fr. Smolich was named provincial of the California Province Jesuits for a six-year term. From 2006 until 2014, he served as the president of the Jesuit Conference of the United States, coordinating the national and international projects of the USA Jesuit provinces. He also worked with JRS in Masisi, Democratic Republic of Congo, in 2015.
Fr. Smolich is a fluent Spanish speaker and enjoys cooking, gardening, and cheering for the San Francisco Giants.
The Climate Change Conference will include a keynote presentation and a panel discussion featuring experts offering diverse perspectives on climate-driven migration.
Panelists
Shelly Culbertson
Senior Policy Researcher at the RAND Corporation
Shelly Culbertson is a senior policy researcher at the RAND Corporation and an associate director of the Disaster Management & Resilience Program (DMR), part of the RAND Homeland Security Research Division. She focuses on disaster and post-conflict recovery, forced displacement, international development, and education. She has led multiple studies about refugees, with a particular focus on education, jobs, humanitarian assistance models, return conditions, and technology, and she co-leads RAND’s Mass Migration Strategy Group.
Culbertson led a hurricane recovery implementation plan for the U.S. Virgin Islands, sponsored by FEMA; a study on municipal recovery capacities needed for Puerto Rico; and a study on post-conflict stabilization of Mosul, Iraq, after the operations against ISIS. Her international development work has focused on the Middle East. She co-led a multi-year effort to advise the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraq on improving education and coordinated RAND’s project to design programs for the Qatar National Research Fund, which has now awarded over a billion dollars in research grants.
Before RAND, Culbertson worked at the U.S. State Department in Turkey and at LMI Government Consulting. Her commentaries have appeared in publications including Foreign Policy, The National Interest, The Hill, Foreign Affairs, and Newsweek, and she has conducted interviews on MSNBC, NPR, and BBC World. Culbertson is the author of The Fires of Spring: A Post Arab Spring Journey Through the Turbulent New Middle East (St. Martin’s Press). She earned her MPA in public policy and international development from the School for Public and International Affairs, Princeton University.
Yves Umuhoza
Chief Executive Officer and Chief Engineer at AEI, Climate and Refugee Education Advocate
Yves Umuhoza is a Burundian refugee with a passion for climate advocacy and refugee education. He has participated in high-profile international conferences, including COP26 (United Nations Climate Change Conference 2021), the Refugee Migrant and Education Network (RMEN) Conference, Rewired Summit Dubai 2022, and World Higher Education Conference (WHEC2022) Barcelona 2022.
Umhoza founded a refugee-youth-led organization in Zimbabwe called Assorted Energies International (AEI). Previously, he managed a project in Tongogara Refugee Camp that received funding from the Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) through the Global Refugee Youth Network (GRYN). He also volunteered with UNHCR Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene.
Umuhoza is a member of the Global Refugee Education Council 2022/2023 under World Vision Canada. He is an alum of the Albert Einstein German Academic Refugee Initiative (DAFI) scholarship program and is currently pursuing a master’s degree in energy and nuclear engineering in Politecnico di Torino in Italy.
Fr. Tom Smolich, SJ
International Director of the Jesuit Refugee Service
Father Thomas H. Smolich, SJ, has served as the international director of the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) since October 2015. A native of Sacramento, he was ordained a Jesuit priest in 1986. He earned a master of divinity from the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley and an MBA from Stanford University.
Fr. Smolich’s priestly ministry has focused on community development. While stationed at Dolores Mission Parish in East Los Angeles, he served as Executive Director of Proyecto Pastoral, a faith-based NGO coordinating community development activity in the parish. After business school, he was a project manager at Mid-Peninsula Housing Coalition, an affordable housing developer in Redwood City.
In 1999, Fr. Smolich was named provincial of the California Province Jesuits for a six-year term. From 2006 until 2014, he served as the president of the Jesuit Conference of the United States, coordinating the national and international projects of the USA Jesuit provinces. He also worked with JRS in Masisi, Democratic Republic of Congo, in 2015.
Fr. Smolich is a fluent Spanish speaker and enjoys cooking, gardening, and cheering for the San Francisco Giants.