About Me
Hi I'm Geoff, a former firefighter turned UX designer. I was born in Monterey, CA and now reside in Santa Cruz, CA. I went to Monterey Peninsula College where I graduated from the firefighter academy and received my Emergency Medical Technicians (EMT) license. After the fire academy, I worked as a firefighter/EMT in San Mateo, CA. During my 5 years as a firefighter, I have fought in some of California's largest forest fires including the CZU Lighting Complex fire, Dixie fire and Glass fire. Although being a first responder was a rewarding career, I wanted a career where I could be more creative and use my empathetic nature to help people build great experiences.
My first encounter with web design was through videos of a pro cyclist online, who also works as a web designer. I always liked that he was constantly working on something new, and it was refreshing to see him really enjoying his job and the projects he worked on. He inspired me to want a job that allowed me to come up with new and exciting ideas, which is why I wanted to pursue a job in UX/UI. I started my UX/UI journey by enrolling in a bootcamp at Thinkful. Although I’m new to this field, I’ve already learned a lot about UX/UI, and have become aware of how we interact with designs daily. I’m eager to continue learning during my time at Thinkful, and am eager to continue learning well into my UX/UI career. One of the things I'm most excited about is the ever-changing environment, where I’ll get to design something new for many different people for many different reasons. One of my goals is to effectively empathize with others and meet many users’ wants and needs.
Through my work, I hope to create designs that will be accessible and functional to all. In addition to being accessible and functional, I aim to create designs that are visually appealing to enhance user experience. Through my previous years as a first responder, I learned to work with a wide range of people with many different roles. This taught me important communication skills that I will use with clients and fellow coworkers. In addition, I had to learn to think quickly on my feet and creatively problem-solve, even when there wasn’t a clear way to resolve the issue. I aim to apply my problem-solving skills to my designs and come up with creative and engaging ways to meet the wants of users. With my current and newly gained skills, I’m excited to enter the UX/UI design industry to create meaningful designs that positively drive user satisfaction and that continue to push the industry forward.