Nile Wilson

Music, math, and science are big passions for Nile Wilson. It started very early as she was studying piano and teaching herself how to code in middle school. Deep down, Nile always knew what she could accomplish.

Online games gripped her attention, and she eventually reached a point when she wanted to design her own. With birthday money in hand, she bought her first book on html and CSS and got busy. Her interests then moved into web design and digital art. She again used her savings to buy the student version of Adobe Suite and began freelancing in early high school in web design. Nile’s first paid gig was designing a grad student’s webpage for their dissertation.

Along with math and science, there was always a place for music in Nile’s life. During her engineering graduate studies, she found time in her busy schedule to fit something new musically. She chose the harp. Nile felt the pressure and drive to succeed as the only Black woman in her PhD program, she took refuge in her harp lessons to lift the weight of academia. Music helped her relinquish feelings of self-doubt and allowed her to awaken the feelings of self-empowerment.

Nile enjoys the challenges and learning experiences that each CSE engagement provides, the opportunity to be a part of a team integrating different skills like machine learning and data intelligence with design. Having a variety of disciplines who work together to solve interesting problems spanning a wide variety of industries is not something she feels is common as a data scientist.

When Nile isn’t busy in the tech world, she still plays her harp. She has her own webpage (https://www.harpsona.com) where you can hear her play and hire her out for a session. One of her most memorable gigs was playing on stage at the Neptune Theatre in Seattle for Jenny Slate’s “Little Weirds” book tour.