Shelby Ross is a PhD candidate in the geography department at the University of Colorado Boulder. Ross is an enrolled member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe and was born and raised on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in southwestern South Dakota. She is a member of the 2020 Tribal Climate Leaders Program inaugural cohort, funded by the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center. Ross's research interests include traditional ecological knowledge, climate change and health, and Native American health. She is currently conducting dissertation research with a mixed methods approach to better understand how extreme weather events are impacting Native American health, specifically with Type 2 diabetes needs. She is also examining traditional ecological knowledge within the Northern Great Plains region. Ross is a Summer research assistant at the Natural Hazards Center, assisting with the Tribal Engagement and Indigenous-Led Public Health Disaster Research.
Ross is a former Gate’s Millennium Scholar (2009-2018), and she earned her bachelor's in conservation biology from Oglala Lakota College in 2016, and her master's in environmental science and engineering from Oregon Health & Science University in 2018. She is a contributor to the Grassland Management Priorities for the North Central Region Report. She has received funding from the University of Colorado Boulder's Solstice Award, the Native Forward Scholars Fund’s Community Impact Award, and the Natural Hazard Center’s FEMA Quick Response Research for Region 8 award.