I am Kelly Heber Dunning, a PhD Student focused on natural resource management in the MIT Science Impact Collaborative and an advisee of Professor Lawrence Susskind. An MIT Presidential Fellow , Policy and Environmental Governance Fellow, Carroll Wilson Awardee, and a social scientist by training, my research focuses on public policy and the socio-economic dimensions of coastal natural resources. Being at MIT has allowed to me leverage a world class setting for training in the natural sciences with innovative practitioners in the realms of public policy, economics, and public dispute resolution. The theory and practice of stakeholder participation in science-intensive natural resource management policy guides my inquiry. Specifically I analyze ecosystem services and theorize natural resources as complex socio-ecological systems.  I am writing my dissertation on collaborative adaptive coral reef management institutions in Indonesian and Malaysian villages under the close supervision of an interdisciplinary committee.