Drawing on her background in facilitation, leadership training and race relations, Jen weaves strategic thinking and a sensitivity to local populations into all her work and, most recently, has inspired her to launch Jen Daniels Consulting. For the past 8 ½ years, Jen held the position of Senior Landscape Architect for the Smithsonian's National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute in the Office of Planning & Strategic Initiatives. Her role included both long range visioning and day-to-day project management for planning, design and construction at the 163 acre, Olmsted-designed park, providing oversight and guidance to ensure major capital projects were in alignment with the Zoo’s mission. She is founding member of the Smithsonian’s Climate Change Adaptation Plan Working Group in which she collaborated on the vulnerability assessment methodology and played a key role identifying potential hazards and environmentally responsible approaches to lessen the impact of climate change related threats to the Zoo. She was also an officer with the Smithsonian’s Sustainability Committee in which she worked on various initiatives to promote and strengthen a sustainability-centered culture across the Institution; including but not limited to the elimination of single-use plastics at the National Zoo and a commitment to bird-friendly architecture. Her diverse background and skill set enable her to approach challenges associated with cultural heritage protection in the face of climate change from a unique perspective.
Jen began her career with Hershberger Design, a landscape architecture firm in Jackson, Wyoming, where her work included the ASLA award-winning Laurance S. Rockefeller Preserve, the first LEED Platinum project in Wyoming.
Prior to her landscape architecture career, Jen worked for seven years in the non-profit sector as a professional community organizer and facilitator on issues related to conflict transformation, leadership training, community development and race relations with indigenous populations in Siberia and the Russian Far East, the Four Corners region of the Southwestern U.S. and community groups in the Northeastern U.S.
Jen holds a BA in Anthropology from Skidmore College and an MLA from University of Pennsylvania School of Design, and post-graduate certificates in conflict transformation from Columbia University’s Teachers College and the School for International Training in Vermont.
