Changes

With a familial background in real estate, Kayla hopes to work as an independent planning consultant while operating a non-profit focused on educating children about sustainability and gardening. In her free time, Kayla loves to hike and camp with her husband and their two German shepherds. An avid nature lover, Kayla finds serenity in the woods and enjoys fossicking for minerals to add to her collection. A random fact about Kayla is that she built a tiny home and lived in it for 3 years while in undergrad at Berea College, where she launched as a University Innovation Fellow in Spring 2018.

With a goal of reducing food waste by 15%, Kayla and her team digitized the recording and management process of the college’s closed-loop composting system in a project that ultimately scaled every level of hierarchy at the college. Kayla recruited an interdisciplinary team of students, staff, and faculty dedicated to influencing student waste behaviors through machine learning and visual nudging. Using the Innovator's Toolkit to teach Design Thinking to students and staff, Kayla led a series of UIF- and EPG-sponsored workshops to engage the Berea campus with the new WOMbat system (Waste Operations Management, behavior altering technology) while gathering insights about consumer preferences in the dining hall. The results of this project enabled students to have more decision making power over meal offerings, in addition to reducing the time and hassle of properly recording food waste.