Laura has worked for many years in wildlife conservation and community engagement through a professional career in the zoo industry and board positions for organisations involved with nature conservation, land care research and natural resource management.
In her PhD, Laura explored how an urban community can build capacity to foster both its biodiversity and wellbeing through a municipal wildlife gardening collaboration. Her current research, using participatory action research, investigates modes of governance that foster co-design, by citizens and local government, of programs that engage urban residents in collaborative biodiversity stewardship on public and private land. Key questions include: How can we nurture sustainable citizen-council nature stewardship collaborations? How can we understand and improve the socio-ecological impacts? How can we link local efforts with regional/state planning & policy?