Nidhi graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2015 with a Masters in Environmental Studies with a focus on Sustainability. She currently works for a global sustainability consultancy where she designs sustainability strategies, develops and implements systems for stakeholder engagement, works on communication and reporting projects and conducts impact assessments for the private sector, inter-governmental agencies and NGOs.

While her international work is fulfilling and impactful, Nidhi’s passion lies in also helping to drive meaningful change in her local community. She is interested in working on solutions to solve immediate problems such as access to healthy food in Mantua where she lives as well as community-based solutions to address broader goals of sustainability. Nidhi is currently working with CDCs in Mantua to implement a neighborhood farm stand project that she has developed that emphasizes community access to quality and affordable produce within a model of neighborhood engagement and empowerment. She is also developing projects to engage the local community on zero-waste. She started that work in 2017 by developing a plan for the PEC’s annual Lancaster Avenue Jazz Fest to move towards becoming a zero-waste event and hopes to expand those ideas to the Lancaster Avenue commercial corridor and into the surrounding neighborhoods.

The goal of these projects is to educate local businesses and citizens, encourage participation in responsible waste management and learn about needs and challenges that could inform policies. Through these projects, Nidhi hopes to contribute to addressing issues of food access for underserved communities and to learn how to develop and implement models that drive behavior change towards sustainable practices at scale.