She earned good grades, and when she graduated UNC in 2008, she took the University of Southern California’s film school by storm, becoming one of the best students in her class.
It wasn’t until she entered the workforce that she started losing steam.
“When I entered my career as a film director, I was quickly put into the woman category, being a woman director,” Maria said. “That and with a combination of many things I didn’t understand at the time, I lost confidence and lost my ambition, and it made me look into why suddenly this person who entered my career with such excitement was such a shell, really.”
Maria responded by delving not only into the gender dynamics in the film industry but in underlying problems women face in the working world. Her documentary, “Pioneers in Skirts,” is currently in production with an anticipated early 2016 release.
Since 2012, Maria and her production team have been traveling across the country, interviewing women in different positions in the workforce: women who return to work after having a baby; Rosie the Riveters — the original pioneers of the female workforce; and young female robotics engineers who have yet to enter the workforce. Maria will cap the production process by taking a look at her own experiences in the film industry.
The film, which will mainly target college students, is meant to illuminate and subsequently eradicate the gender biases in the workplace before current college students graduate.
“I want women and men to be more aware of what they bring to the table in the workplace,” she said. “I want them to be more aware of the biases that enter their mind as they see women in roles they’re not used to, and I want women to see the biases too.”
Lauren McDonald, a UNC senior and a public relations major, has experienced Maria’s passion firsthand. She’s been a full-time volunteer for the film, working on public relations since the beginning of summer.
