KINGSTON, R.I. – June 5, 2025 – The remarkable journey of University of Rhode Island engineering and Japanese double major Emily Stewart has no finish line in sight. In fact, it continues next fall 6,000 miles or so from her hometown in the Land of the Rising Sun.

Stewart, a Providence, Rhode Island, native and Talent Development scholar, will transfer to Niigata University in Japan next year as part of the university’s five-year International Engineering Program, where she will earn her Bachelor of Arts in global language and area studies with a concentration in Japanese.

One of four children in her family, Stewart spent her childhood helping her father around the house with various hand-on projects, setting the wheels in motion for her future academic pursuits, and as a fan of Japanese culture – everything from music to fashion – URI gave her the opportunity to chase both passions through the IEP.

During in a time in which the Pacific Rim and Asia are experiencing increased global importance due to their robust economic growth and growing influence in global affairs, engineers with proficiency in Japanese will be in high demand, which puts Stewart on the fast track to a successful career in civil engineering upon earning her degree at Niigata.

“This has been my plan from the beginning,” Stewart said. “A lot of engineering companies I know of have Japanese branches that are based in America or European companies with branches in Japan. There’s a lot of potential for job opportunities, which is exciting.”

Stewart’s relationship with her father laid the foundation for her success. He had always wanted to study engineering, too, but grew up during dark periods of racial tension that prohibited from him pursuing his dreams, so he made sure his daughter pursued hers.

“He saw a lot of himself in me,” she said, “so he encouraged me to do it.”

At Classical High School, Stewart participated in a youth program at DownCity Design in Cranston, Rhode Island, that offered introductory-level exposure to architecture, graphic design, and construction. She had always felt drawn to URI, particularly the IEP, so she enrolled as a TD scholar to help cover tuition and other costs, meeting several like-minded students during TD’s Summer Success Program the summer prior to her freshman year.

Talent Development provides access and resources for Rhode Island residents from underrepresented and underserved populations, many of whom don’t know which path to travel in college. While Stewart always knew her preferred destination, TD still served as a valuable resource during her initial adjustment period at URI.

“If I ever needed anything, I just reached out,” she said. “Talent Development helped with building a community and allowing me to better understand what college would look like. After the program, when everyone else started coming in, it was a little bit overwhelming, and without TD, I would have never been able to really process everything in a healthy way.”

Stewart immediately got involved on campus, joining URI’s chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers, where she gained valuable leadership training, professional development and mentoring opportunities, and career placement services. Through NSBE, she attended regional and national conferences, including visits to Syracuse, Atlanta and California, meeting many industry professionals who provided exceptional guidance.

“At the conference they take what we do on campus here and then multiply it by like a thousand. Everything is amplified,” Stewart said. “Between career fairs, prep programs, and networking events, you meet so many people, including students from Canada or Africa representing our national chapters. It was an incredible learning experience.”

For the past two years, she’s served as NSBE president, using her platform to help the organization build strong relationships with other student groups on campus to increase membership and overall awareness.

In addition to working part time with TD at its headquarters at Taft Hall, Stewart also earned multiple internship opportunities, first with Skills for Rhode Island’s Future, a program that offers job search support, career enhancement services, and free training program opportunities to unemployed and underemployed Rhode Island residents. In 2023, she joined e2 engineers in New London, Connecticut, as a structural engineer intern, a position more closely associated with her future line of work.

Structural engineers specialize in the design and analysis of structures to ensure they are safe and stable – anything dealing with the “skeleton of a building,” as Stewart puts it. She will spend this upcoming summer with e3, her last as an intern, before heading to Japan for the fall.

Stewart also continued to develop her passion for Japanese culture at URI, participating in a hands-on partnership between URI’s Japanese program and Davisville Middle School in North Kingstown where a group of students in URI’s Pre-Advanced Japanese course visited the school to share lessons in international culture and language. URI remains one of only a handful of colleges and universities in the state to offer Japanese language instruction.

Stewart’s meteoric rise and precise path to excellence is no accident; she arrived at URI four years ago with a well-thought-out plan and stuck to it no matter the circumstances. From getting her hands dirty helping her father with small projects to walking to and from her after-school program on weekdays in high school, she has committed herself to a career in engineering for as long as she can remember.

Nothing – not even long distances – can stop her now.

“I’m looking forward to what’s next,” Stewart said. “You can never stop learning, especially in this industry.”