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Living and working in Cotonou, Benin allows me to witness firsthand the obstacles and potential solutions involved in development engineering. I am honing my values and priorities while living in a different country, and my experience there has reaffirmed my dedication to a humanitarian engineering career. I have discovered a line of work that excites and energizes me.

Biography

After graduating magna cum laude from Howard University in May 2022, Civil and Environmental Engineering alumna and Karsh STEM Scholar Cameryn Burnette began a career aimed at engineering low-tech solutions to positively impact developing areas. She is currently a Special Project Manager at Energicity Corp in Benin, West Africa; Energicity “is not just building solar grids, but cultivating electricity ‘ecosystems’ by implementing programs that influence trade, education, and communication in rural areas.”  

In January, Burnette received a Schwarzman Scholars fellowship. The second-ever Howard alum to receive this honor, Burnette is  part of the eighth cohort for one of the most prestigious graduate fellowships in the world. Through this fellowship, Burnette aims to earn her PhD in Material Science to create materials for safe, sustainable, modern infrastructure with an early focus on bio-inspired materials and biocomposites after matriculating from Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. She plans to create polymers that have the functionality of petroleum plastics and enhanced degradation abilities so they can decompose, rather than accumulating on the Earth’s surface or break down into microplastics. She is also interested in exploring the potential of enhancing natural materials for use as building materials. 

In addition to the Schwarzman Scholars fellowship, Burnette also received a presentation award for her research “Nanoindentation of bovine meniscus for localized properties.” She expects to eventually lead her own lab and work as a professor to inspire students, similar to how her Howard professors motivated her.