education

northern illinois university, dekalb, il
m.s. in earth, atmosphere, and environment, 2025
b.s. in meteorology, 2023

harold washington college, chicago, il
a.s. in natural and environmental sciences, 2020

the school of the art institute of chicago, chicago, il
attended 2011–2013
photography, foundry work, installation

professional experience

aviation weather observer
midwest weather, inc. – chicago & rockford, il
june 2023–present
recorded thousands of metar/speci observations
for faa operations at kord and krfd
issued speci reports for hazardous aviation weather
collaborated with atc and nws to enhance aviation safety

forecaster
northern illinois university
nov 2022–apr 2023
produced cool-season hazard-focused forecasts
briefed university leadership to inform safety planning

research experience

graduate research assistant
northern illinois university
aug 2023–jul 2025
thesis: “capturing high-impact weather in a fine-scale climate simulation using the model for prediction across scales — atmosphere (mpas-a) v7.0”
analyzed mpas-a data (1990–2019) to evaluate model representation of the mean climate states as well as tropical cyclones

undergraduate research assistant
northern illinois university
nov 2022–aug 2023
explored warm-season climate extremes
presented at ams 2024; precursor to thesis

reu fellow
national weather center, university of oklahoma
summer 2022
paper: “investigating variability in the number of tornadoes among landfalling hurricanes”
analyzed tornado variability in landfalling hurricanes using python and gis
presented at ams 2023

conference presentations

michaelis, a.c., digilio, j., et al. “representation of high-impact weather in a novel high-resolution climate-scale simulation using mpas-a”, 38th conference on climate variability and change, ams, jan 2025

michaelis, a.c., digilio, j., et al. “evaluation of a novel high-resolution climate-scale simulations using mpas-a”, 37th conference on climate variability and change, ams, jan 2024

digilio, j., schenkel, b. “investigating variability in the number of tornadoes among landfalling hurricanes”, third symposium on mesoscale processes, ams, jan 2023

technical proficiencies

weather tools: asos, ids4, bukfit, gr2analyst
programming: python, ncl, latex
gis: arcgis pro, qgis
os: windows, linux, macos

affiliations

american meteorological society
national weather association
phi theta kappa honor society
illinois geographical society (honorary member, 2023)

volunteer & leadership

cooperative weather station observer – niu (2020–2023)
trustee – ams niu chapter (2021–2022)
student advisor – niu department of earth, atmosphere, and environment (2020–2023)