Tessa obtained her MSc at the University of Edinburgh in 2006 where her dissertation focused on children’s perceptions of quality family time. After finishing her MSc she returned home to California and worked as a Children’s Service Specialist for a non-profit organisation that assisted homeless families in Los Angeles. She then shifted her career working for the Research Division of a non-profit organisation whose mission is to promote quality reproductive health care for all. She was the Research Administrator and later took on the additional role of Institutional Review Board (IRB) Coordinator. When she moved to England in 2011 she worked as a Clinical Trial Coordinator at The University of Warwick. Tessa started working at The University of Birmingham in October 2017. She currently works with a team of clinicians, nurses, translational research scientists, and clinical trialists within the field of head and neck cancer.