Jenna Davis

Jenna Davis is the faculty advisor to the Poop Group and director of Stanford's Program on Water, Health & Development. Her research and teaching focuses on the interface of engineered water supply and sanitation systems and their users in developing countries. With a background in public health, infrastructure planning, and environmental science & engineering, Davis explores questions related to interventions that trigger household investment in water, sanitation, and hygiene improvements; the features of water and sanitation services that users value and why; the health and economic impacts of improvements in water supply and sanitation; and the keys to long-term sustainability of installed infrastructure.

Over the past 15 years she has carried out applied research in more than a dozen developing countries, including most recently in Zambia, Bangladesh and Uganda. Davis and her group (the “poop group”) have extensive experience in designing and implementing primary data collection (through household surveys and environmental sampling) in resource-constrained environments across developing regions. She teaches undergraduate- and graduate-level courses in public health, water and sanitation planning in developing countries, and the theory and practice of sustainability. She is also research and teaching is focused at the interface of engineered water supply and waste management systems and their users, particularly in developing countries.