Natalie played volleyball as a kid and was in the high school Marching Band.  She went on to USC, her dream school and majored in Public Relations.  She was set to graduate early with job opportunities in sight when suddenly, while in a taxi in Las Vegas, an auto accident resulted in a C5 spinal cord injury. After three months in the hospital Natalie returned to USC and finished her degree.  She found her place with dance when she joined an internationally recognized wheelchair dance team called the Rollettes. In addition to taking classes, conducting research in a lab, developing a health monitoring data collection system, and serving as Digital Officer of the Viterbi Graduate Student Association, she also leads an Accessibility Initiative with the Viterbi School of Engineering to promote disability awareness/resources for students.

Natalie graduated with an MS in Communication Data Science from USC in spring 2024 and is interested in disability engineering and assistive technology.