A Palm Beach County high school student is celebrating a huge national honor.
Last week, 17-year-old Maria Elena Grimmett was the grand prize winner of a $100,000 scholarship in the Siemens competition in math, science and technology in Washington D.C.
Grimmett, a senior at Oxbridge Academy, won for her work on identifying new water purification systems.
Grimmett said it's a project she's been working on ever since sixth grade when she wanted to find out why the well water at her home was brown.
She hopes her win motivates her peers to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and math otherwise known as STEM.
“I really hope that it will inspire kids to be more interested in STEM topics, because STEM really is key to our future as our nation especially, because we constantly have new problems that are coming up, and finding new solutions is going to be extremely important,” said Grimmett.
Grimmett says she wants to continue to develop her work on water purification, but she's still not quite sure yet which college she wants to attend.
A huge congratulations to Maria Elena Grimmett! Just hours ago, Maria Elena was announced as the Siemens Competition Scholarship winner of $100,000 for individual research. We are so proud of you!
Posted by Oxbridge Academy on Tuesday, December 8, 2015
