Kelsey Freeman, a graduate student of the MS/MA ’25 program, has dedicated ten years to amplifying community voices. In 2020, she authored the acclaimed book, No Option but North, which is based on her extensive interviews with Central American and Mexican migrants in a shelter in central Mexico. This autumn, Freeman is tackling a long-standing issue: the disconnect between state-level clean energy initiatives and the unique requirements and sovereignty of tribal nations. This disconnect makes it challenging for tribes to participate fully and reduces the effectiveness of these programs.
Freeman remarked, “California Native American tribes are disproportionately subjected to prolonged outages, high energy costs, and lack of electricity access. If we can help connect what researchers at Stanford are learning with input directly from tribes, we can see direct policy impact.”
Freeman’s role at Stanford University is somewhat atypical but might serve as a prototype for a broader initiative at Stanford’s Precourt Institute for Energy, a component of the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability. As a social science research scholar for the institute, she collaborates with the California Energy Commission (CEC), Native American tribes, and Stanford researchers to enhance policies that affect tribal energy access, planning, and development.
William Chueh, the director of the institute and a Stanford professor, noted, “Kelsey is also helping us explore whether and how the Precourt Institute might create a larger one-year fellowship program for recent Stanford graduates.”
David Hochschild, CEC Chair, stated, “The embedded-researcher model is an experiment that has worked, at a time when a program such as this is needed more than ever.”
Breaking into Policy Work
Freeman’s early career extensively involved working with Indigenous communities. She shared, “I became interested in Native education, and how education can be a vehicle for asserting tribal sovereignty and nation building.”
In Oregon, Freeman collaborated with the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs to develop a college-preparation program for Native American students. She observed that federal and state policies often failed to align with tribal governance and staffing capabilities, impacting program effectiveness. This experience highlighted how policies formulated without tribal input can undermine their intentions.
With the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, Freeman’s focus shifted towards energy policy. She identified opportunities for community benefits in clean energy development but also recognized gaps in access and awareness.
To delve deeper into these challenges, Freeman pursued dual master’s degrees at Stanford as a Knight-Hennessy scholar—one in international policy at the School of Humanities & Sciences and another in environment and resources in the Emmett Interdisciplinary Program at the Doerr School of Sustainability. Concurrently, she engaged in tribal clean-energy work through the Precourt Institute’s Shultz Energy Fellowship. In the summer of 2023, she assisted Nevada tribes in securing federal funding via the Nevada Clean Energy Fund. More recently, she supported the newly expanded tribal affairs team at the CEC.
Original Story at energy.stanford.edu