Talking about being a great leader is one thing. Experiencing what it takes to guide others firsthand is something else entirely.

For two aspiring leaders from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at The Grainger College of Engineering, that experience came in the unlikeliest of places — a rural Peruvian hillside, elbow-deep in clay and brick. Over two days, they worked with a cohort of classmates from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign to build enclosed, roof-ventilated stoves for Peruvian families. The goal was to minimize the detrimental air qualify effects of indoor open-fire cooking, which has been common in Peruvian households.  

 "It taught us a lot about working with each other under pressure," said Mythri Subash, a materials department student. "We had time constraints and it was a completely new thing to a lot of us."

Subash and Joseph Kallal found themselves involved in this Peru adventure through the Engineering Learning Assistant (ELA) program from Illinois Grainger Engineering. Students across the college are appointed by Grainger First-Year Experience (GFX) to teach the introductory ENG 100 course to first-year students and serve as peer mentors. There are close to 200 currently active ELAs. Only a fraction of that number — the leadership cohort who signed up for a course called Global Leadership Training (ENG 377) — had access to the travel opportunity.

Kallal is a head ELA for the college in 2026, overseeing curriculum and leadership, while Subash is focused on materials science needs as a lead ELA.  They were the only two materials department representatives in the Peru trip cohort.

Peru trip participants found themselves traveling from city to city over nearly two weeks abroad, resting at hotel stops in Chinchero, Ollantaytambo and Aguas Calientes to take part in tourism experiences and service projects. In Cusco, after meeting with college students from the Universidad Nacional de San Antonio Abad del Cusco (UNSAAC), the group stayed with local Peruvian families. Kallal counts his homestay family among the highlights of the trip, along with the guidance of the group’s local tour guides, who he said worked hard to keep the itinerary on track even as plans shifted. 

Keeping everything on schedule was not easy, however. A complication with the Peruvian Department of Tourism caused the group trouble securing tickets for sightseeing at Machu Picchu. A key lesson of leadership is learning how to adapt when unexpected issues occur, and the group worked out a solution when their experience was delayed. 

“We had to stay another night in Aguas Calientes and wait in line until 4 a.m. to guarantee we got them,” remembered Kallal. “Well worth it, in both of our opinions.”  

That wasn’t the only moment where the group had to adjust on the fly. Throughout the trip, timelines would often not hold up exactly as they were scheduled. A 20-minute bus ride might become an hour, or a start time could shift with little warning. Kallal found value in learning to roll with those changes as a type of leadership training. 

“That was a little bit to get used to, but I don’t think I would change anything — even the early starts,” Kallal said. 

Their service experiences were also worth the effort, according to Kallal, and typically very hands-on. In one instance, the cohort hiked up a mountain to assist the non-profit organization ECOAN with planting trees as part of a reforestation effort in the Andes mountain range. Students helped gather data about the health of previously planted trees as part of an effort promising substantial local impact.

“They only repopulate the area with indigenous species, so they bring back healthy wildlife that was there hundreds of years ago and previously destroyed,” said Kallal. “In certain areas, they plant things the communities can use for economic development, such as coffee or cacao that can be grown and exported. Those are very in-demand products to developed nations that bring cash flow.” 

Outside of service, the group learned how Peruvian weavers build traditional textiles and discovered how to cook classic Peruvian meals as a team, using a pit in the ground and hot stones. That cooking process was a lesson in the value of group collaboration. 

“Everybody that lived in the commune had their own individual part they played,” Kallal explained. “Someone was digging the hole, someone was making the tamales, someone was marinating the meat, and everybody came together to put that to work and make something better than the sum of its parts.” 

The ELA cohort met for this trip in the Chicago O’Hare Airport as just classmates, but united in the days that followed to become friends. 

“The trip taught me to encourage more bonding events in our department so that we can understand how everyone’s working together,” she said. 

“The trip taught me to encourage more bonding events in our department so that we can understand how everyone’s working together." - Mythri Subash, Illinois materials science and engineering student

As president of the materials department student organization Material Advantage during the fall 2026 semester, Kallal sought to find lessons he could apply to his own leadership style. When the cohort was building home stoves together, he realized the value of servant leadership — when a leader puts themselves in the trenches as a form of group guidance. 

“We worked with a project lead through Proyecto Peru named Tina,” Kallal said. “Whenever we said, ‘Hey, we don’t know what to do next on the stove, can you help us?’, she didn’t tell us what to do. She got in there, elbow-deep in the mud and helped us put stuff up. When she could tell we had a better understanding, she kind of slowly pulled herself out. 

“I hope that I can emulate that sort of leadership for the ELAs that I will lead over the course of the year, but also for the students that I will be teaching in the fall.”