Appointments

Annie Maxfield has been helping advanced degree students and trainees across disciplines pursue their career of choice for nearly 10 years. Nationally, she is the Design and Development Lead for ImaginePhD, a free and confidential online career exploration and planning tool for humanities and social sciences that also has been used with many STEM fields. She also grew national employer education and recruitment for doctoral students by establishing the Virtual Master’s & PhD Career Fair (STEM) and worked with Connected Academics and the American Historical Association on initiatives such as Faculty Training, Humanists@work, and the MLA Doctoral Student Career Planning Guide. Annie has a strong foundation in working across industries and disciplines and is happy to support graduate students and postdoctoral scholars in whatever they choose to pursue. Annie’s areas of advising expertise include: the employer perspective, career exploration and planning, strategic job and interview searching, the intersection of identity and career, values, networking, professional communication, and negotiation.

Pronouns: She/Her/Hers

Colleen Gleeson has over 10 years of university career services experience working with students at all academic levels. She spent three years working with graduate students studying public policy at the LBJ School of Public Affairs, where she also worked with employer partners across sector, industry, and policy area to engage with graduate students across campus. Prior to her time at UT, she served as director of career development at the University of Houston Conrad N. Hilton College of Global Hospitality Leadership. Colleen enjoys working with graduate students and postdocs to identify new and exciting career paths, internships, and other experiential opportunities. Areas of expertise include graduate career exploration and industry job search prep, including resume and cover letter support, mock interviews and navigating federal job applications.

Loren Cressler brings a broad perspective to working with graduate students and postdoctoral scholars on career exploration and professional development. Since completing his PhD in English at UT Austin, Loren has worked as a writing advisor for medical school and residency applicants with an ed-tech startup and taught literature and writing at Seattle University. He also worked as an in-house recruiter for both technical and non-technical positions at Google Cloud. Areas of expertise include career exploration, industry job search preparation, the academic job market, and professional development within and outside academia.

Sadiya received her PhD in Biomedical Science from UT Health San Antonio where she spent her time not only developing her skills as a scientist but also serving the graduate student population as the Presidential Ambassador for the Graduate School and a member of student council. Prior to joining Texas Career Engagement, she taught genomics at St. Edwards University and was a high school science teacher in the Rio Grande Valley. Student success is the heart of Sadiya’s work. She deeply cares about being an ally to advanced degree scholars while providing inclusive career and professional development support for advanced degree scholars.

Anastazja Harris works to provide career-related education and advising for graduate students and postdoctoral scholars. She has over five years of experience teaching public speaking and team communication, and developing communication-focused training programs. She has a background in communication studies and is finishing up her Ph.D. at UT Austin in Organizational Communication & Technology. Her dissertation project studies people’s opinions on how artificial intelligence-infused tools are used to assess applicants during the hiring process. During her time at UT Austin, she has worked with University Housing & Dining and the Division of Campus & Community Engagement to plan events and lead initiatives to support graduate students. Anastazja received her B.S. in Psychology at UNC-Chapel Hill and M.A. in Communication Studies at UT Austin.

Kirsten provides practical, hands-on career education and advising for advanced degree students, including folks who are seeking to change or advance in their careers. She graduated from UT-Austin with a PhD in American Studies in 2016, where she taught writing and American Studies courses to students across disciplines. Since then, she’s built a career in marketing, with an emphasis on creating high-impact, data-driven programs. Most recently, Kirsten worked as a Segment Marketing Manager in a B2B SaaS scale-up. Prior to that, she was the Marketing and Data Analytics Manager at the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), where she was instrumental in launching both a strategic recruiting program and a new cascade journal, PNAS Nexus. In her spare time, Kirsten is an avid two-stepper, clothing designer, and hiker. An inveterate problem-solver, she loves helping students figure out how to get unstuck and create plans to achieve their career goals.

Dr. Ku has been at his current position for more than five and a half years, providing individual coaching for graduate students and postdoctoral scholars in career exploration, job searches, and professional development in STEM fields. In addition to establishing and maintaining relationships with employers, he also plans, develops, and executes career exploration and professional development seminars and workshops and networking and recruitment events. Before coming to UT, Dr. Ku was a product marketing professional with more than 13 years of experience in the biotechnology industry, including at Ambion, Life Technologies, and EMD Millipore. Prior to joining the biotech industry, he completed postdoctoral training at both UT and Baylor College of Medicine. He received an MBA from UT, a PhD in Cell and Development Biology from Harvard University, and a BS in Biology from the University of South Florida. Dr. Ku’s expertise spans across all career-related topics, though he is most excited to advise on career exploration, job/internship search strategies for non-academic jobs, academic job searches (faculty and postdoctoral positions), CVs, cover letters, research statements and teaching statements, and resume and cover letter review and editing.

Pronouns: He/Him/His

Tatem Oldham is a licensed counselor with 15 years of experience in career counseling and hiring/recruiting. She specializes in helping humanities and social sciences graduate students transition into the world of work and effectively market themselves to potential employers. Tatem’s services include helping students convert their CVs to resumes, articulate their transferable skills to employers, and prepare for interviews. Tatem is most excited to help College of Liberal Arts students brainstorm potential career paths.

Pronouns: She/Her/Hers