Kevin Schawinski graduated from Cornell University in the United States in 2004 with degrees in both physics and mathematics.

He was awarded the Royal Astronomical Society's 2008 Michael Penston Prize for his doctoral thesis "The Star Formation History of Early-type Galaxies".

While a graduate student at Oxford, Schawinski founded the citizen science project Galaxy Zoo along with researcher Chris Lintott,[5] which later became the Zooniverse.

[6] His research at Yale included studies of black holes, galaxy formation, and co-founding the citizen science project Planet Hunters.

[19] In 2020, Schawniski discussed the future of Modulos with Guy Spier[20] Schawinski has worked on a range of topics from galaxy evolution, black hole astrophysics, citizen science and artificial intelligence.