“I choose to be an engineer to help the country produce clean electricity and reduce its carbon imprint,” says McAndrew-Benavides, a manager of industry infrastructure at the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry group in Washington, D.C., that promotes nuclear energy.
Although the 31-year-old is on the leading edge of the Millennial generation, she shares many traits with her younger cohorts, including constant career revamping and a passion for sustainable energy. She says this passion motivated her to get an undergraduate degree in nuclear engineering and a master’s degree in educational leadership. She is now pursuing a Ph.D. in organizational leadership.