Dr. Ma. Sheilah G. Napalang is a professor and the current director for research and publication at the School of Urban and Regional Planning. She served as the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Project Development of the Department of Transportation on secondment from July 2019 to 2022 and was the Director of the UP National Center for Transportation Studies from July 2016-July 2019. She continues to serve as a Research Extension Fellow of the Center. Dr. Napalang is one of the core members of the Women in Transport Leadership (WiTL), a knowledge-sharing network aimed at creating knowledge, fostering innovation and empowering female-to-female collaboration to address diverse transport challenges, particularly issues related to gender and transport. She was recently recognized as one of the 30 Remarkable Feminist Voices in Transport by the Women Mobilize Women, the global flagship initiative for women in transport initiated in 2018 as part of the “Transformative Urban Mobility Initiative” on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). Dr. Napalang obtained her Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering from Xavier University at Ateneo de Cagayan, Master of Science in Civil Engineering major in Transportation from the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg, Virginia and her Doctor of Engineering Degree major in Infrastructure Economics from the Tokyo Institute of Technology in Tokyo, Japan. She is a licensed Civil Engineer and Environmental Planner. Her fields of specialization include transport economics, social impact analysis, and institutional studies. Her main advocacies include equitable and people-friendly transportation infrastructure, integrating accessibility and gender issues in transport planning, and transport safety.
