Shelby Emilien

Shelby Emilien was born on the Island of Mauritius. Throughout her education, she demonstrated strong interest in arts, literature and languages, being several times a price winner in those subjects at school.

Extremely curious and passionate about her surrounding world, she took BSc (Honours) in Political Science with specialisation in International Relations (2009-2012) at the University of Mauritius with the view of getting involved in international organisations. Her dissertation on Education was selected among the best dissertations of her cohort to be presented at the academic workshop of the Organization of Social Science Research of Eastern and Southern Africa (OSSREA) on ‘Political Governance, Conflict Management and Anti-Corruption Policies’.

After her degree, she made her first incursion in the world of collaborative partnership and dialogue through the Rio+20 Mauritius Event- an experience which definitely changed her life. Due to her strong interest in sustainable development, and especially the field of ecology, she thereafter had a two months internship as a field worker at the Mauritian Wildlife Foundation (a world renowned organisation exclusively dedicated to the conservation and restoration of endemic species of Mauritius) in the Passerine Recovery Project on the nature reserve of l’Ile aux Aigrettes.

Through internship she experienced more closely what it means to live in community. Being away from home many times and living with new people in an entirely different environment and was very enriching for her. After this, she took employment as a part-time translator (English-French) and journalist for the Mauritius Tourism news magazine, a field where she considerably improved her writing skills as well as her marketing skills.

Shelby presently lives in Mauritius and joined the One Island Team as a Project Assistant and Intern in March 2013.