INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Young leaders are helping to shape the future of our community, and at Eli Lilly and Company, a Colombian scientist is bringing this innovation to life.

At 16, Paula Angarita Rivera came to the United States from Colombia by herself with hopes of one day becoming an engineer.

Now, she’s making strides in one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies.

“Lilly combines two of my most important things: My passion, which is engineering, and my purpose, which is helping people very fast,” Rivera said.

Rivera focuses on developing groundbreaking medicine at Lilly, a job she says she loves.

“With the medicines that we make here, with the devices that we make here, we are impacting the lives of millions of people at once, and that for me that is the impact that I want to make in the world,” Rivera said.

Rivera is the principal scientist for the Bioproduct Research and Development organization in the company, a role she doesn’t take for granted.

“Our goal is to identify biomarkers – a biomarker is a measurement from your body. It could be your weight, it could be your glucose to track the progression of our medicine. And so during clinical trials, we can make sure we are giving good medicine to our patients,” Rivera said.

She says obstacles never kept her from following her dreams. With help from Marian University and the unconditional support of her mom, she’s made her dreams possible.

“When something doesn’t go well, I try to speak up, and I told my (college) advisor I want to become an engineer and will do anything to make it possible. So thankfully, this person was very supportive of the idea, and I became (a part of) what is called pre-engineering,” Rivera said.

Eventually, she received her master’s in mechanical engineering at IUPUI, marking another milestone. Despite already an extraordinary beginning, she says there’s still more work to be done.

“My journey changed me, and I understand really early in my professional career that the reason why I got here in Lilly is because I have people along my journey who supported me, and I have to be that support for other people who don’t know how to get here,” Rivera said.

Rivera is also the vice president of Region 6 for the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers. She was recognized as an honoree by the Hispanic Executive’s NextGen Collective’s 30 Under 30.

She says she plans to advocate for women and minorities in science, technology, engineering, and math for years to come.