Mattin, Product Designer

Now

Now

This page is inspired by my friend Karen Ni’s old portfolio, and it is “nice reminder for myself, when I'm feeling unfocused. A public declaration of priorities." 

summer 2020 🌞

I’ve graduated from university, so no more academics or extracurriculars! This summer, I’m still working at Ubiquity Press as a UX Design Intern, and I have the privilege to be consulting for Oracle through Berkeley Innovation! When I’m not designing professionally, I’ve been filling my time through practicing yoga, learning how to be a better plant parent, reading, drawing, and socially distancing!

spring 2020 🌻🎓

Academics

In the classroom, I’m finishing up my last two Political Science courses to graduate:

  • Public Opinion and Polling — a Political Science course I’m really excited about because of it’s implications for UX Research + survey design.

  • Urban and sub-national politics in developing countries, incorporating principles of economics, urban design, and politics into one course.

And I have the huge opportunity to serve as a Teaching Assistant for the student-initiated and facilitated Human-Centered Design course at Berkeley!

Extracurriculars

When I’m not busy with schoolwork, I’ve been:

  • Mentoring a team of four consultants as we design for SoFi. My project mentors have always been so helpful and spurred a lot of my growth as a designer, so I’m really looking forward to paying it forward my last semester here.

  • [Still] Serving as the Internal Executive Director for the Middle Eastern-North African Recruitment and Retention Center, an organization on campus that seeks to recruit and retain students of color into higher education.

  • Continuing my internship with Ubiquity Press to design a SaaS platform where journal managers, press managers, and editors have the opportunity to control the front-end interfaces of their websites.

Personal

When I get free time, I’ve been:

  • Learning JavaScript on Codecademy so that I can bridge design and implementation.

  • Making too many playlists and discovering new music (currently on a Jhené Aiko wave).

  • Practicing social distancing 😔

  • Still practicing Perso-Arabic calligraphy!

  • Reading the How to Live series by Thich Nhat Hanh and learning more about mindfulness.

  • Reading The *New* Program for Graphic Design by David Reinfurt and User Friendly: How the Hidden Rules of Design Are Changing the Way We Live, Work, and Play by Cliff Kuang and Robert Fabricant to learn more about design as a practice.

 

fall 2019 🍂

Academics

In the classroom, I’m learning about:

  • Bio-inspired design and how we can use the natural world as inspiration for solutions to human problems.

  • The mechanisms of the American Presidency, how it’s evolved, and different frameworks we can use to analyze it.

  • Technology entrepreneurship and what it takes to turn a business idea into a successful startup.

  • Campaign media and strategy, learning how to reach and market to voters, and how to run a successful political campaign.

Extracurriculars

When I’m not busy with schoolwork, I’ve been:

  • Consulting with Berkeley Innovation, the human-centered design consultancy at Cal! This time around, a team of 3 other consultants and I have been working with YouTube to envision what a paid fan experience could look like for fans of celebrities such as sports players and musicians.

  • Serving as the Internal Executive Director for the Middle Eastern-North African Recruitment and Retention Center, an organization on campus that seeks to recruit and retain students of color into higher education.

  • Continuing my internship with Ubiquity Press to help design a new community portal for members of the Ubiquity Partner Network and polish up changes to the repository project.

Personal

When I get free time, I’ve been:

  • Reading The Defining Decade by Meg Jay, a book about your twenties and how to make the most of them.

  • Still finding + reviewing new restaurants in Berkeley and the surrounding area!

  • Practicing a lot of Perso-Arabic calligraphy!

 

spring 2019 🌷

Academics

In the classroom, I’m learning about:

  • Design frameworks, with an emphasis on the history of design fundamentals and incorporating sustainability into design.

  • The politics and history of Sub-Saharan Africa.

  • Multiculturalism in theory and practice in post-WWII western societies (an area of special interest for me as a child of immigrants).

  • Intermediate Farsi, with a focus on intensive vocabulary, writing, and oral practice.

Extracurriculars

When I’m not busy with schoolwork, I’ve been:

  • Designing with Berkeley Innovation, a human-centered design consultancy at Cal. This semester, a team of 4 other consultants and I have been working with Ubiquity Press to help develop a platform to improve the attending and organizing experience of academic conferences.

  • Working with the Middle Eastern—North African Recruitment and Retention Center, an organization that encourages students who identify as Middle Eastern—North African to come to Berkeley and retains them socially and academically once they are here. This semester, I’ve been doing all our visual design and branding work while getting ready to transition into our Executive Director position for next year.

Personal

When I get free time, I’ve been:

  • Expanding my knowledge by using Lynda/Linkedin Learning courses on design, web development, and other areas that interest me (I previously wasn’t aware that all UC Berkeley students have access to these courses for free!)

  • Exploring my Iranian identity and reading The Limits of Whiteness by Neda Maghbouleh, which documents the racialization of Iranian in the United States and the discrepancies between official categorizations and lived experiences.

  • Finding new restaurants in Berkeley and the surrounding area.

  • Buying way too many Ladle & Leaf salads from Snackpass.

  • Discovering new music and remixes on Soundcloud.