Celeste is a computer scientist and researcher focused on understanding human factors in security operations. She works for the government, has been speaking on technology for over 10 years, and earned her Ph.D. in Human-Centered Computing from UMBC.
HacDC is a 501(c)(3) non-profit hackerspace in Washington D.C. that aims to improve the world by creatively rethinking technology. Celeste joined the HacDC community in 2014 and served as President on the 2015 Board of Directors.
KDE is an international community that develops free and open software for desktop and portable computing. Celeste was involved in (and later led) the KDE Usability Project from 2004-2012 and served on the KDE e.V. board of directors from 2009-2012.
Kubuntu is an operating system that provides the KDE suite of software in a user-friendly Linux distribution. Celeste provided usability and design support from 2006-2011 and served on the Kubuntu Council from 2008-2010.
Open Usability is an organization that offered expertise to improve the usability and design of open source projects. From 2006-2011 Celeste helped support many open source projects in their efforts to integrate usability and design principles into their software. She was a mentor (2007-2009, 2011) and program coordinator (2009) for the OpenUsability Season of Usability, a short-term internship-style mentoring program that matched early-career designers to work with open source projects.