Dan was born and grew up in Bolivia. He was an exchange student in Thailand and before finishing undergraduate studies, he hitchhiked across Africa from North to South with his sister. After graduating from Kansas State University in Natural Resources Management in 1984, he was appointed as a Marshall Scholar to the United Kingdom. In 1987 he obtained a Ph.D. at the University of Reading, with fieldwork in tropical Bolivia. His dissertation was a soil-based assessment of the sustainability of an alternative to slash and burn agriculture.

His life interest is the sustainable use of the Amazon. Between 1988 and 1993, he did postdoctoral work in the Agroecological Studies Unit at the International Center for Tropical Agriculture in Cali, Colombia. In 1993 he returned to Bolivia and has worked as an independent consultant in Protected Areas Management and Agroecology. He lives and farms in Rurrenabaque,the Bolivian gateway to the Amazon and to Madidi National Park. He has been on the faculty since 2005, having taught courses in each of the cohorts to date.

• SLC 605 Food and Water Security
• PRC 604 Research Design and Methods
• PRC 609 Monitoring and Evaluation
• PRC 681 Practicum Design and Planning
• PRC 682 Practicum Applied Research I
• PRC 683 Practicum Applied Research II
• PRC 684 Synthesis and Integration
• ECC 504 Technologies for Conservation Practitioners
• ECC 507 Fundamentals of Ecosystem-based Conservation
• ECC 508 Sustainable Livelihoods and Incentives to Conservation
• ECC 602 Community Change and Sustainable Livelihoods