Katie Siesel combining work, play through natural resources
Sitting in her office in the Natural Resources Building, Katie Siesel beamed from ear to ear as she talked about her avid love for skiing, bicycling and an excursion as a rafting leader down Cataract Canyon. Surrounded by potted trees and plants, Siesel laughed as she recalled her memories of outdoor recreation as a child.
Raised in San Diego, California, Siesel said apart from day hikes and trips to the beach, she didn’t grow up doing a lot of outdoor recreation.
“We would always play outside with bikes and stuff, but we never went camping or anything like that, so no one really knows where her desire for all this outdoorsy stuff came from,” said Leeann Siesel, her older sister by two years.
Katie said she was a very high-achieving child, and so most of her weeks were filled with soccer competitions or homework.
“I think I was so focused on wanting to be an engineer, and I had all these grand plans for myself. I wanted to go to a very prestigious college. Then I kind of realized that I wasn’t really happy,” Katie said.
After taking and loving an advanced placement environmental science class in high school, Katie realized she always wanted to be outside and do outdoor recreation — she just never had the chance. With encouragement from her teacher, she started to look at natural resources.
“I kind of found like, ‘Oh, natural resources is a really great combination of work and play where you work outside,’ and I wanted to make the world a better place,” Katie said. “I love science and ecology and people, and it’s a lovely intersection of all those things.”
After graduating from high school, she decided to move to Logan to pursue a degree in conservation and restoration ecology with a minor in watershed sciences.
Siesel attributes her ability to move to an entirely new state to her personality and her habit of stepping out of her comfort zone.
“I do things that scare me, whether it’s like, becoming a raft guide, which I had never done before and it scared the living daylights out of me,” Katie said. “Even just moving out of state to college or jumping into things kind of headfirst.” Katie said she thinks of herself as a brave, ambitious person and said those traits have helped put her in spaces where she has been able to grow.
Leeann said Katie has always gone after what she wants, and even from a young age, she wasn’t afraid to be herself and stand out.
“When we were in elementary school, she would always wear these crazy knee-high socks. Some would be rainbow colored, others had soccer balls on them,” Leeann said.
Leeann said she thinks Katie’s authenticity has carried over into adulthood and helped her as an adult in pursuing her own passions and accomplishing goals.
One accomplishment Katie is proud of is helping run the internship program within the Quinney College of Natural Resources.
After the previous adviser holding the position left, Katie took over. Katie said the role isn’t typically taken on by a student, but the previous adviser felt like it would be a good challenge for her.
“It’s really cool to be like, ‘Oh, because of all the work I did, all these people now can have these really cool opportunities over the summer,’” Katie said.
Not only has Katie been a mentor and adviser to students in the QCNR, but she has also held leadership positions as a member of the Alpha Chi Omega sorority.
“It’s unexpected, I know,” Katie said. “But I think that because I’m like, slightly above average in a lot of different ways, it has really aided me in some of the work that I’ve been doing, so I appreciate my flexibility and being able to navigate a lot of different kinds of situations.”
Katie said she works a lot with the executive board of Alpha Chi on their philanthropy, domestic abuse prevention. She said she participates in bonding activities like paint nights with other sorority members.
Another challenge Katie took on was to help plan the QCNR camp in the fall of 2022. She said during the pandemic, students were struggling to find opportunities because they weren’t able to take any field-based courses.
Katie said she wanted to help students gain experience they could put on their resumes, so she worked with others in the college to plan a fully-funded trip for students to spend a weekend in the canyon and learn field skills.
Not only did Katie help plan the QCNR camp, but Nate Crawford, a friend and fellow QCNR student council member, said she volunteered to be the chef for the trip.
“She was an amazing cook with a kickass attitude and not even the rain could bring her down,” Crawford wrote in an email to the Statesman.
Katie said cooking is one of her favorite things to do and her favorite dish to make is homemade pasta and sauce.
“If I have a free day on the weekend, I love to just make a really stupidly complicated recipe for no reason. Because I really like it and I love sharing that with people,” Katie said.
Katie said her true passion in life is human connection.
“What makes me happy is not necessarily like my career or my achievements, it’s the people that I’m around and it’s the cool things I get to do with people I love,” she said. “It’s really cool watching people’s growth, and I’m just glad I get to be part of their journey.”
-Savannah.Burnard@usu.edu
Featured photo by Sam Warner