NPCC partners with Portland State University faculty to advance scholarship in the field of mediation and government collaboration through training and on-the-ground projects. Our affiliated staff and faculty include:
Jennifer Allen, PhD, Hatfield School of Government (she/her)
Jennifer Allen is associate professor of public administration in the Hatfield School of Government. Her areas of research encompass environmental and natural resource policy and administration and sustainable economic development, with particular focus on non-regulatory approaches to toxics management, collaborative natural resource management, and rural-urban connections. She teaches in the environmental and natural resource specialization in the master's in public administration program and in the graduate certificate in sustainability program.
Jennifer was part of the team that launched PSU's Institute for Sustainable Solutions in 2006, and she served as director until 2015. She has previously worked at the World Bank, Ecotrust, and the Oregon Economic and Community Development Department. She currently serves on the board of Illahee and has previously served on the boards of the Oregon Forest Resources Institute, Shorebank Pacific, Portland Energy Conservation Inc., the Portland Sustainability Institute and the Food Alliance.
She holds degrees from Yale University, Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, and George Mason University.
Direlle R. Calica, JD, Institute for Tribal Government (she/her)
Direlle Calica is a citizen of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. She is of Warm Springs, Wasco, Yakama, Molalla, and Snoqualamie tribal descent. She is the owner and managing partner of Kanim Associates LLC, which is a Native American-, women-, and veteran-owned company located in Oregon with an office in Colorado. Kanim Associates LLC provides environmental, energy, entrepreneur, and art/culture expertise services to tribal, government, professional, and organizational clients.
Direlle has more than twenty years of experience as a legislative, policy, planning, and regulatory advisor, and she is a member of the Washington State Bar Association. She has worked in the field of tribal relations for the US Attorney’s Office (District of Oregon) and the US Army Corps of Engineers and has been an advisor to various Indian Tribes on external relations. Direlle also has extensive professional experience in intergovernmental affairs, hydro-system planning related to tribes, water management, environmental entrepreneurship, and tribal energy policy. She has also served as a White House Intern and as a Mark O. Hatfield Congressional Fellow in the US Senate. Direlle has also served as an Adjunct Professor in the Indian Law Program at the Northwestern School of Law at Lewis and Clark College, where she received her Juris Doctorate with a focus on Federal Indian Law, Business and Natural Resource law. In addition to serving as an Oregon Native American Chamber board member, she serves as a member of the board of directors for the Northwest Energy Coalition, council member on the Oregon Energy Facility Siting Council, and she is a Bonneville Environmental Foundation director emeritus. Direlle is also faculty and director of the Institute for Tribal Government at the Center for Public Service, Hatfield School of Government at Portland State University.
Connie Ozawa, PhD, College of Urban and Public Affairs (she/her)
Professor, Urban Studies and Planning, College of Urban and Public Affairs
Director, PSU-China Innovations in Urbanization Program
PhD, Urban Planning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
MA, Geography, University of Hawaii
BA, Environmental Studies, University of California, Berkeley
Connie Ozawa researches and teaches about the ways in which information is integrated into public decision making in the areas of environmental policy and resource management. Connie has published articles on mediated negotiations in the Journal of Planning Education and Research and Conflict Resolution Quarterly, several book chapters on collaborative processes, and a book, Recasting Science: Consensual Procedures in Science-Intensive Public Policy Making. Connie served as director of the Toulan School of Urban Studies and Planning from 2009 to 2015.
Craig Shinn, PhD, Hatfield School of Government (he/him)
Emeritus Professor, Public Administration
Coordinator, Division of Public Administration, Master in Public Administration Specialization in Environmental and Natural Resource Management
PhD, University of Washington
Master of Public Administration, Lewis & Clark College
BS, University of Maine
Craig Shinn's research interests center on questions of environmental governance, collaboration, civic capacity, organization and institutions, social aspects of sustainability, and inter-jurisdictional administration of natural resources.
Birol A. Yeşilada, Ph.D. Hatfield School of Government (he/him)
Director of the Mark O. Hatfield School of Government
Professor of Political Science and International Studies
Endowed chair in Contemporary Turkish Studies
Principal coordinator of PSU’s National Center of Academic Excellence in Cybersecurity for the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security
Dr. Yeşilada is a professor of political science and international studies at Portland State University (PSU). He also holds the endowed chair in Contemporary Turkish Studies. He is the principal coordinator of PSU’s National Center of Academic Excellence in Cybersecurity for the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security. He is vice president of the International Studies Association and is a member of the TransResearch Consortium. Previously he served as Director of the Middle East Studies Center at PSU (2014-17).
Dr. Yeşilada’s research covers global power transition, cybersecurity and cyber defense policies, international conflict resolution, the European Union, Cyprus, and Turkey. His publications include eleven books and over thirty articles and book chapters. He has been an invited policy consultant at the US State Department, national defense agencies of the US government, the Council on Foreign Relations, the RAND Corporation, Booz Allen Hamilton, the Nathan Associates, Barclays Capital, the World Bank, and is an Academic Associate of the Atlantic Council. In 2003, he was invited by the White House and participated in writing the new Constitution of Afghanistan.
He is a member of the Rotary Club of Portland and past-president of the Rotary Club of Tigard, Oregon.