Geneva Alana Dora List

BIOGRAPHY:

Geneva List is a Senior Staff Associate at the Columbia University Climate School, with a joint appointment between the National Center for Disaster Preparedness (NCDP) and the National Science Foundation Science and Technology Center Learning the Earth with Artificial Intelligence and Physics (LEAP). 

With over a decade of experience at the intersection of environment and international development, Geneva specializes in climate risk management and program evaluation. From 2018 to 2024, Geneva served as the monitoring and evaluation lead and project manager for climate services and index insurance projects at the International Research Institute for Climate and Society (IRI), working extensively across Latin America, Africa, and Asia.

Before the IRI, she supported climate finance and agricultural programming in Latin America and the Caribbean at the Inter-American Development Bank. She also served as a climate change and environmental sustainability policy analyst at the Canadian International Development Agency (now Global Affairs Canada) and contributed to the Canadian International Food Security Research Fund at the International Development Research Centre. Geneva is passionate about engaging with stakeholders and beneficiaries in the field, having contributed to NGO programming on disaster relief and socio-economic development in Nicaragua and Peru. 

She holds a Master of Arts in Geography and Development Studies from McGill University and a Bachelor of Arts in Geography with an interdisciplinary minor in International Development from the University of Victoria, British Columbia. Her research focuses on the accessibility and last-mile effectiveness of climate change adaptation approaches, and she has published in Climate Risk Management, Climate and Development, Natural Hazards, and the Journal of Hydrology.