Submission Number: 308
Submission ID: 1110
Submission UUID: a292c9c6-f3fc-4d82-98ff-82850784a174

Created: Fri, 03/03/2023 - 17:06
Completed: Fri, 03/03/2023 - 17:06
Changed: Wed, 05/07/2025 - 11:28

Remote IP address: 2803:9810:610b:5110:61d8:4425:2b77:b5e7
Submitted by:Anonymous
Language: English

Is draft: No

Flagged: Yes
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Karlee
Bane
she/her
APO
AE
United States
09464
Environmental Engineering
English (5), French (3), Spanish (1)
I’d say I became a world traveler starting in elementary school. It began when my family moved to England for the first time in 2012, when I was 8 years old. As my brothers and I were homeschooled, my family often took our education on the road, and we ended up traveling all over Europe. We went everywhere from France to Turkey, Italy up to Norway. I always loved exploring new places and seeing how people around the world lived differently. It fascinated me just how many different languages there were, and how some places were defined by their mountains, while others were defined by their architecture or beaches. We moved back to the US three years later, and when I was 12 I visited the continent of Africa for the first time. I went to Rwanda with my mom to meet the two girls we sponsored. While I was there my eyes were opened to a new category of differences: poverty. Almost all the people we interacted with lived in some level of poverty, many in extreme poverty, and when I witnessed a little girl carrying a huge water jug on her head, I couldn’t believe that this was a reality of life for many kids just like me. I think that was the moment I decided that I wanted to do something, that I couldn’t let the next generation of kids miss out on their education simply because they have to walk to water. We moved back to England in 2019 and that’s when I started traveling internationally “independently” – with my sports teams. After 3 years of getting through customs without my parents and communicating with Germans on my own, I felt pretty confident with international travel. That set me up for my gap year, and I am currently in my fourth continent – South America. I am doing a Water and Sanitation internship with EcoSwell in rural Peru, which I’m hoping will jump-start my Environmental Engineering studies at CU Boulder with first-hand experience. As I’ve been blessed with numerous opportunities to see the world growing up, I hope to continue to do so while simultaneously mitigating the clean water and water scarcity crises around the globe.
There are many factors that constitute someone’s personality, so it would be quite impossible to list everything that would make up an ideal floor-mate. And to be honest, I love getting to know different people from all sorts of different backgrounds. So, I’ll just focus on shared aspirations. I’d like to live with people who are dedicated to making their world a better place. Not just for themselves, but for the marginalized, vulnerable, and overlooked communities near and far. I want to live with people who seek to use their professional experience to train those who desire to fix their own infrastructural and developmental problems and just don’t yet know how. I want to live with people who will take the time to design and develop technologies that make solving those problems more efficient and effective. However, the desire to do all those things is nothing without the grit to make it happen. Consequently, it’d be amazing to live with people who have enough of a sense of adventure and aspiration to make their ideas come to life. I’d love to live with those who are willing to step out of their comfort zones to pursue big challenges and big dreams. A holistic approach to achieving their dreams is also crucial, so as not to neglect the whole picture in the context of world problems. Patience and persistence are key, as long-lasting change takes a while to materialize. Most importantly, the underlying motivation for creating change should not be self-centered but should stem from a deep love for others and a desire to help them as much as they require.
I am majoring in Environmental Engineering, and hopefully minoring in Global Engineering, with a focus on clean water access and wastewater management. The whole reason I am studying this area is to use my knowledge to help improve access to clean water in the rural communities of developing nations. I want to frame my education in a global context, and being involved in the Global Engineering RAP is an immersive way to do that. I will be able to easily collaborate with other engineering majors who want to focus on world problems, and together we can create a holistic understanding of the way our world works, as well as the dysfunction that needs to be addressed. I’m excited about the way we will be able to live, work, and grow together with a common goal of taking our expertise to a global market, and I hope to be able to learn as much from everyone else as I hope to teach them.
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