Sophie Rodriguez
I am the Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Advisor at the Internet Society Foundation. Previous to this role I was actively involved in academia as a tutor at the International Studies program at Leiden University, and lecturer at the Communications Management program at The Hague University of Applied Sciences. In the context of a multicultural classroom, I engaged in discussions about new media and digital culture, digital methods and politics of social media.
I have also worked in the development sector in Latin America for several years, specifically in fundraising and research. As a Researcher and Monitoring Officer, I worked with multilateral, bilateral, non-governmental, educational organizations on themes of governance and political culture in the Andean region. In 2017 I moved to The Netherlands where I conducted research for academic and non-academic sectors. Most recently, I collaborated with Twente University on a longitudinal study, with participants from over twenty countries, focused on how the Coronavirus crisis has impacted people’s visions of the future in a post-pandemic era.
Although I was born in the United States, I grew up in Quito where I studied Sociology at Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador and achieved a post-graduate degree in Communication and New Media Studies from Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar. In 2014 I graduated from Leiden University with a Master’s degree in Cultural Anthropology. My research examined how digital youth-led activism is connected to new forms of political participation, within transnational social movements. I am based in Dordrecht, where I enjoy bike riding with my twin daughters on my trusty bakfiets, practicing my Dutch-language skills, and (re) reading Latin American literature.