Staff Spotlight: Kre Britt
Kre Britt, the Undergraduate Program Administrator, oversees the administration of the undergraduate program, including class scheduling and registration, class management, and laboratory staff. Before joining the Chemistry Department in 2022, she was a graduate student in anthropology. During this time, she conducted archaeological research in the American Southwest, worked with several different collections of archaeological materials at the Field Museum, and assisted in a World War II recovery mission with the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency.
What is your current position at the Department?
I'm the Undergraduate Program Administrator. I'm part of an amazing team that manages undergraduate chemistry placement, scheduling, and registration and that supports the many chemistry courses offered throughout the year.
Could you tell us about one of the most unusual or interesting jobs you've ever had before working at Northwestern?
Once upon a time, I was an archaeologist which afforded me a few interesting jobs. I taught at a field school in Arizona for many summers and have worked with some amazing museum collections, including a cargo worth of ceramics from a shipwreck in the Java Sea. I also had an opportunity to work with the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency excavating an American World War II plane from a mountainside in the Philippines to recover the pilot's remains to return to his family. Because the location was quite remote, we set up camp on the mountainside and got used to sleeping at an angle.
Where are you from and where did you grow up?
I grew up straddling the Mississippi River, my time split between rural Missouri and slightly less rural Illinois. In hindsight, I can appreciate a childhood spent exploring the woods and the fields, but I was one of those kids who packed up their car and moved away the day after high school graduation.
What is a hobby or activity you do outside of work?
When I have time, I enjoy sewing. My mom taught me the basics when I was a kid and by the time I was a teenager, I was altering thrift store finds and making my homecoming dresses. Even though I packed my mom's 1970s machine when I left home, I fell out of practice for a long time. During lockdown, I pulled it back out and have been slowly building a me-made wardrobe ever since.
If you could meet anyone, living or dead, who would it be and why?
I used to study ancient pottery, so it would be really interesting to sit down with a potter who lived a couple of thousand years ago and learn about the way they made ceramics and the decision-making process behind raw material procurement and construction techniques.