Hi, I'm Kaci!

I'm currently a senior at UT Austin, studying Management Information Systems, Business in the Canfield Business Honors Program, and Informatics.

I'm a designer, strategist, and creative technologist passionate about education, environmental sustainability, and social equality.

In my free time, you can find me reading a book, cooking something new, filming a short, or enjoying the outdoors!



Portfolio • Medium • LinkedIn • Github

Here are some things I'm currently working on and have worked on in the past.

current:

  • Staff Writer @ Texas Design Journal
    writing and researching about design
  • Student Researcher @ Human-AI Interaction Lab
    conducting research on participatory AI design
  • Independent Study @ UT Austin
    conducting research on game-based learning under Dr. Rosenblum
  • Executive Board Member @ Product@TX
    mentoring cohort of students with an interest in product management

    • previous:

  • Product Management Intern @ Redfin
    collaborating with designers, engineers, and various stakeholders to improve mortgage efficiency through automation
  • Product Designer @ Develop for Good
    designing and applying behavioral science at ideas42 to reduce recidivism at scale
  • Student Mentor @ Code Orange
    teaching East Austin elementary and middle school students the fundamentals of coding through interactive projects
  • President @ Texas Convergent
    led UT's first interdisciplinary entrepreneurial organization to equip students with the necessary skills + resources to develop tech-powered products and drive the future of innovation
  • Operations Learning + Development Intern @ Apple
    worked on improving development conversations by highlighting learning + development opportunities using insights from user research
  • Business Development Intern @ Well Aware
    developed content + social media strategy to help bring awareness to water scarcity + sustainable clean water solutions in East Africa
  • Product Build Team Director @ Texas Convergent
    co-directed Build Team program for +60 leads and members to develop MVPs for personal finance and community tech products
  • Product Designer @ thousandthread
    designed mobile app and website using insights collected from user interviews and behavioral psychology theory
  • Designer + Strategist @ Hult Prize Accelerator
    developed design + business strategy for Via, a youth-based tourism startup co-founded by 7 other team members and myself
  • Sustainability Tech Product Build Team Lead @ Texas Convergent
    guided +20 members in building sustainability-focused tech products
  • Studio Member @ Design for America
    partnered with YMCA to design a solution that improves lifeguard retention using design thinking techniques
  • EdTech and IoT Build Team Member @ Texas Convergent
    built dynamic email templates and an automated Alexa Skills drink maker
  • Communications Chair @ Honors Business Association
    led a production team to film and edit videos to recap and promote internal events
  • Layout Designer @ Spark Magazine
    designed two layouts for UT’s student-run fashion publication
  • Campaign Visual Designer @ GenHERation
    designed a bus wrap, stickers, flyers, and displays for annual networking trip for over 500 high school and college women across the U.S.
  • UX Design Mentee @ projekt202
    redesigned offline educational platform using user research insights

    • current interests:

  • HCI, behavioral design, future of education, creating short films, photography, biking, mixology, creator economy, cooking

    • things I care about:

  • tech literacy, closing inequality gaps in education, asian representation in film & cinema, upholding truth and protecting democracy

    • likes:

  • learn + apply educational interfaces, chai with a splash of hazelnut syrup, double-wall glass coffee mugs, scandinavian design, authenticity, matcha soft serves, thoughtful people, chicken & waffles, Figma, oddly specific Spotify playlists, Queen's Gambit, spontaneity, brunch, il dolce far niente, New Yorker cartoons, Andy Matuschak's work

    • oddly fascinated by:

  • deliberative democracy theory, arrival distribution curves, product packaging design, flavor combos, backpack design

    • not a fan:

  • ragweed pollen, mosquitoes, sock tans, poorly seasoned avocado toast, cookie-cutter neighborhoods, pocketless dresses

    • thoughts:

  • Adaptability is comfort. 7.17.21
  • No company is better than mediocre company.
  • Public libraries are the greatest gift to humanity.
  • Curiosity leads to experimentation. Experimentation is the foundation of innovation.
  • In startups, you have to be an inch deep and a mile wide. In established companies, you have to be a mile deep and an inch wide.

    • people:

  • Leonardo da Vinci
  • Eleanor Roosevelt
  • Brian Chesky
  • Brene Brown
  • Julie Zhuo
  • David Kelley

    • quotes:

  • "The goal of research, in its purest form, is not to have the last word but to keep the conversation going..." – Kate L. Turabian
  • “Talent hits a target that no one else can hit. Genius hits a target no one else can see.” – Arthur Schopenhauer
  • “When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favour.” ― Elon Musk
  • "The problems of the world cannot possibly be solved by skeptics and cynics whose horizons are limited by the obvious realities. We need men who can dream of things that never were." – JFK
  • “As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands: one for helping yourself, the other for helping others.” – Audrey Hepburn
  • “Design has allowed us to stand out; to look different and show that difference boldly.” – Joe Mansueto
  • “Creativity requires input, and that's what research is. You're gathering material with which to build.” – Gene Luen Yang
  • “Art is the highest expression of the human spirit.” – Joyce Carol Oates
  • “We obtain our education at home, at school, and, most important, from life itself. The learning process must go on as long as we live. Nothing alive can stand still, it goes forward or back. Life is interesting only as long as it is a process of growth.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
  • “Humility is the soul. Curiosity is the mind. Empathy is the heart.” – John Gorman
  • “To be nobody-but-yourself — in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else — means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight.” – E.E. Cummings
  • “There is no human being from whom we cannot learn something if we are interested enough to dig deep.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
  • “The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
  • "The designer does not begin with some preconceived idea. Rather, the idea is a result of careful study and observation, and design is a product of that idea." – Paul Rand

    • essays:

  • How Learning Happens | David Perell