Esther Obonyo is the Executive Director of the Global Building Network, a partnership with the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe. She is an Associate Professor of Engineering Design and Architectural Engineering at Pennsylvania State University, and an affiliate faculty of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, College of Medicine (Public Health) and the Institute for Computational Data Science.

Dr. Obonyo is also the Strategic Initiatives Director for East Africa of the Penn State Global Programs which facilitates Penn State’s leadership in global engagement through brokering regional partnerships for institution-to-institution collaboration. She is also a Steering Committee member and Technical Advisor at the New Kensington Innovation Corridor. 

Dr. Obonyo served as the interim director of the Humanitarian Engineering and Social Entrepreneurship program from January to August 2017 while concurrently working in the Office of the Vice Provost for Global Program Office as Penn State’s Inaugural Global Faculty Fellow. During her tenure as a fellow, she designed and developed a new science diplomacy-driven, cross-disciplinary partnership for research and education in Kenya. She was also the facilitator in the Penn State-led Convening of Multi-sectoral stakeholders in Nairobi in May 2016.

Dr. Obonyo was also a 2015-2016 Jefferson Science Fellow placed in the USAID Global Development Lab. She served as the Senior Policy Advisor on the Digital Development for Feed the Future (D2FtF) team. D2FtF is a collaboration between the USAID’s Global Development Lab and the Bureau of Food Security which aimed to study the use of Big Data Analytics for evidence-based decision-making. Dr. Obonyo also worked with the Research Partnerships for Development team under the Center for Data, Analysis, and Research on issues related to improving the generation and use of scientific research to address development challenges. In addition, Dr. Obonyo also designed strategies for enhancing the Partnerships for Enhanced Engagement in Research (PEER) program, a USAID-funded program implemented by the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to fund collaborative research being led by developing country scientists and engineers and develop new activities that address gaps in the local research ecosystem.

Beyond her academic credentials, Dr. Obonyo has extensive industry experience, having worked as a Construction Engineer, Project Manager, and Innovations Analyst in several engineering and construction companies in Kenya, the United Kingdom, and the United States. She has two registered ventures for sustainable products from Kenya, Nyarkendu Solutions and Nyarkendu Technologies. Dr. Obonyo is also the technology and entrepreneurship advisor of Gunga Women Group, which is a social venture in rural Kenya for the food value chain, since 2016. Her work has been disseminated through over 150 journal papers, conference proceedings, and presentations. 

Dr. Obonyo graduated with a 1s Class bachelor’s degree in Building Economics (Quantity Surveying) from the University of Nairobi. She received her Master’s in Architectural Technology from the University of Nottingham, UK. Finally, she received her doctorate degree in Civil & Building Engineering from the University of Loughborough University, UK.