Pranoti Asher, Ph.D., (she, her, hers) is the assistant director for grants and education programs at AGU.

She has also served as the inaugural scholar in residence at the American Geosciences Institute. Asher works in close partnership with the AGU Ethics and Equity Center as the lead staff member for the AGU Bridge Program, a component of the National Science Foundation (NSF)-sponsored Inclusive Graduate Education Network. The AGU Bridge Program was initiated in 2019 to develop, adopt and share inclusive practices for recruiting, admitting and retaining women and underrepresented students in STEM graduate programs.

Prior to joining AGU, Asher spent 18 years as a geoscience faculty member. In her last faculty position, she was a tenured member of the geology and geography department at Georgia Southern University in Statesboro.

Asher has received numerous NSF grants that support her current work on the intersection of education, outreach and workforce development for the geosciences, as well as workforce development for Earth and space science faculty and their students at two-year and four-year colleges.

She received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in geology from the University of Bombay, India, and a Ph.D. in the geological sciences from the University of Connecticut.