Leonardo is a native from Ambato, Ecuador and started his Ph.D. in Spanish Linguistics in Fall 2018. Before joining the program at Georgetown, Leonardo completed a B.A. in Organizational Psychology and two M.A.s, one in Spanish at Saint Louis University and another in Spanish as a Second or Bilingual Language at Michigan State University. His research interests are sociophonetics (especially, the vowel system of Kichwa-Spanish speakers and Spanish monolinguals from Ambato), language perception, and heritage speakers whose home language is Kichwa. Leonardo has presented his research in conferences in Mexico, Canada, and Spain.
Outside of Academia, Leonardo enjoys traveling, great food, cats, hanging out with friends, and running.