Maria Briones believes all people, no matter where they live, have a basic human right to proper sanitation and clean water. Her big idea—and her career goal—is to bring it to them.

She’s already begun. In 2011, she traveled to the highlands of Guatemala with URI Engineering Professor Vinka Craver and the student group, Engineers for a Sustainable World, to help build an onsite wastewater treatment facility for a village school in San Mateo Ixtatan. She was heartbroken by the difficult circumstances the residents faced due to a lack of clean water.

“That trip to Guatemala impacted me a lot personally, to see so many people who lack this basic human right. I understand the technical side of the issue and the health-related aspect, and I know I can help these people on a personal level,” said Maria, whose extended South American family views flushing toilets and running water as luxuries.

As an international engineering student, Maria spent a year in Spain, first studying at the University of Cantabria and then interning at a nearby research institute, where she developed computer simulations of aeration tanks at wastewater treatment facilities to optimize their operation.

“It was really interesting and very, very difficult,” she admitted. “It’s all about fluid mechanics, which I didn’t know a lot about. And learning the technical aspect of it in a different language was really difficult. My mind was working in overdrive to understand it all.”

Back at URI, Maria conducted research to measure greenhouse gases emitted from wastewater treatment plants, served as an ambassador to foreign exchange students and as president the University’s chapter of Theta Tau, a professional engineering fraternity.

What’s next? Graduate school. The Peace Corps.  “Maybe I’ll work for a government agency like the Environmental Protection Agency or a global institution like the U.S. Agency for International Development,” she says. “Or maybe I’ll establish my own organization that has to do with developing water technologies to help people get access to drinking water. That’s my dream.”