Why did you enter the tech space?

I started teaching myself to code at 13 because I though it sounded cool! This grew into building websites for small businesses in high school and college, where I found my web into web security and ethical hacking.

What motivates you?

To me, hacking is a superpower that can be used for good or evil, and I’m dedicated to ensuring that more women and underrepresented groups can harness that power to protect humanity.

What’s your favorite project that you’ve been a part of?

As a capstone for my Master’s in Cybersecurity, I created a tool to improve the secure code review process at my previous employer, Coalfire. As an Application Security Penetration Tester, I often perform code reviews for clients to find vulnerabilities, but our current process is very slow and manual. I created a command line tool using LLM + RAG capabilities to ingest code scanning alerts and provide better recommendations to pentesters about where to focus in the code. Then, testers can ask followup questions to expand on a vulnerability, create exploit code, and generate remediation instructions for the report.

Describe yourself outside of tech!

I grew up in Montana, so I am an expert country swing dancer, and also do other kinds of dance like Lindy Hop and Salsa (also fortunate to have a wonderful partner in dance and life for 8 years, he’s also from Montana). We have a lovely black cat named Jiji after the one in the move ‘Kiki’s Delivery Service’. I also love to travel and have been to over 20 countries (favorites are Italy, Romania, and Thailand), and so I really like learning languages. I have a degree in Spanish, and speak a little Italian, Portuguese, and French as well.I love reading sci-fi and fantasy books, and am currently on book 12/15 in the ‘Wheel of Time’ series. Another fun fact is I’m a triplet (not identical though!).

Any tips for new grads?

Be realistic about getting your first job in cybersecurity: it will take most people 2-3 years of consistent studying to get that first role. In the mean time, work any job that pays the bills, and build out a study plan to specialize in a specific area (don’t be a generalist). When you know enough to do a job well, start publicizing yourself as much as you can through attending meetups, posting on LinkedIn, starting a blog, volunteering in your community, etc… and you will be able to get that job no problem.

What does being a part of RTC mean to you?

I loved organizing a local meetup in Washington, D.C. where we went to the Air & Space Museum and got gelato. It was fun to get everyone in one space and help make connections for others, and to hear about all of the amazing projects everyone was working on. I’ve planned another meetup in a few weeks where we will be doing ‘Crafting & Connecting’, I’m excited!