Carlie is a University Innovation Fellow and an undergraduate studying bioengineering (with a biomaterials concentration) at Clemson University. Her hometown is Hilton Head Island, South Carolina where she has grown up an ‘island girl’ playing beach volleyball and swinging to live music. She developed a true sense of family in the community back home and a passion for people that she wished to carry on in college and her life. Carlie knew she wanted to help people in some form and found that her most effective way in engaging people was to develop personal relationships and challenge their current way of thinking, ultimately opening hearts and minds.

During her time at Clemson, Carlie has joined and taken on a leadership role in the Design and Entrepreneurship Network (DEN) that one of her co-UIFs founded in 2013. The environment she was exposed to in DEN encouraged her to apply for UIF as she saw much purpose and reward to design thinking and creative innovation. She has also always had a case of wanderlust and was able to explore bits of Southeast Asia while participating in a research internship in Singapore at Nanyang Technological University. This was a summer program she found very enlightening as it confirmed her desire to continue innovation within her field of study, specially applied to sports engineering.

From not exactly knowing her true place in the world, Carlie was able to find a home in the Innovation and Entrepreneurship culture. This type of environment has allowed her to embrace her athletic, musical, academic, and social sides. Upon completion of this program, Carlie hopes to continue and spread her design-thinking mindset as she always meets new people to share ideas with and encounters fortunate opportunities.