I graduated with a master's degree in sociology from the University of Graz, Austria, in 2004 and subsequently gained a second master's degree from the Centre for Research in Modern European Philosophy at Middlesex University, UK. Prior to defending my Ph.D. thesis (Limits of Meritocracy. How Fields of Study and Gender Segregation Affect Social Stratification in Finland) in 2014 at the University of Turku, I worked as a junior researcher at the Research Unit for the Sociology of Education (RUSE). From 2014-2016, I was a senior researcher on the  INDIRECT - project (Intergenerational Cumulative Disadvantage and Resource Compensation, PI: Jani Erola) at the Department for Social Research of the University of Turku. Subsequently, I joined the Turku Institute for Advanced Studies (TIAS) as a postdoctoral researcher (2017-2019), working on social class differences in gender-atypical educational pathways in Finland. From 2019-2022 I worked as a university lecturer in sociology at the University of Turku.