Rubén Ortega-Álvarez currently is a posdoctoral fellow at the IIES, UNAM. He is a Mexican ecologist and ornithologist who collaborates in different projects regarding bird study and monitoring in the Neotropics, particularly on topics related with community and population ecology, species under risk, community-based monitoring, and participatory research. He has joined as an instructor in workshops aimed to train members of rural and indigenous communities on bird monitoring and avitourism. He works together with academic, governmental, non-governmental, and community institutions for developing research and conservation initiatives, mainly focused on birds.