Kelsey Rooney is an Anthropology Ph.D. candidate at the University of Chicago, currently researching the historical and contemporary maritime practices of coastal Senegal through land-based and underwater archaeology. She holds an M.S. in Maritime Archaeology & Conservation from Texas A&M University, and has been scuba diving since being certified in cold Massachusetts waters in 2010. Since then, she has worked on underwater projects in Cyprus, the Bahamas, and Lake Champlain, Vermont, and other archaeological projects in Senegal, Turkey, Texas, and New England.  She received her Divemaster, once again in cold waters (but this time Lake Michigan).