Originally from Ankara, Turkey, she has been in the U.S. since 1992. Before she joined UW in 2006, she received a master’s degree from the University of Cincinnati and a doctoral degree from the University of Michigan, both in planning, and practiced as a GIS specialist and planner at a county planning agency in Ohio. Her teaching and research interests include ecological land planning, human dimensions of natural resource protection, and GIS use in urban and environmental planning.