ANNE CAI‘10
The aperture through which Anne Cai ‘10 looks at life is wide open. She has always pursued multiple interests and passions. While at Porter-Gaud as a Krawcheck Scholar, she reveled in being pushed outside her comfort zones. One of her favorite Krawcheck memories was attending North Carolina Outward Bound the summer between her 10th- and 11th-grade year. “Somewhere between bushwhacking through Pisgah National Forest and clinging to a vertical rock surface, I realized I had become comfortable. I was awkward and quiet when I arrived; now I was leading hikes and setting the pace. Expanding my comfort zones was a vital aspect of furthering my personal growth and becoming an understanding and contributing member of the community,” says Anne. Anne went on to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for a bachelor of science in mathematics and in political science with minors in management science and economics. She was awarded the “Outstanding Political Science Undergraduate Thesis” prize and the William L. Stewart, Jr. Institute Award for outstanding contributions to extracurricular activities and events. She also served as the concertmaster and assistant concertmaster in MIT’s Symphony Orchestra, played in chamber music groups, and led MIT’s award-winning student newspaper, The Tech, as editor in chief. Today, Anne is a senior economic consulting analyst at the Analysis Group in Boston. The firm provides economic and financial analysis in litigation matters, usually supporting the expert testimony of top economics and marketing professors. She has worked on cases in areas ranging from mergers and acquisitions and health care litigation, to the design and analysis of experimental surveys in matters of false advertising, trademark infringement, and public policy. The work is heavily quantitative, involving analysis of big data using statistical programs like SAS and Stata. Regarding the building blocks of her quantitative skills, Anne credits Porter-Gaud teachers such as Mrs. Ellison in middle school for introducing her to the world of competitive math beyond class material and Mrs. Fox in the upper school for supporting her continued interest in higher-level math. “I love the quantitative side of data — the hard proof — but what I also enjoy is the qualitative nature of the work. There’s always another side, another angle to the data that you have to discover, interpret, and understand,” says Anne. “Beyond the analytical data skills, the job requires strong writing and communication skills. Teachers at Porter-Gaud like Dr. Slayton, Dr. McArver, Mr. Moore, and Mrs. Chanson helped me build that necessary foundation.” For Anne, the sky’s the limit. “I just like to keep my options open,” she says.
Photo Credit: James ‘95 and Sara Ewing
29