It’s truly an exciting time for the Engineers Without Borders (EWB) team at Rose-Hulman!
We are in the middle of the 2012-13 work year and our team is bustling with activity. Our latrine project in Batey Santa Rosa, Dominican Republic is progressing well and we are planning to return to Batey Santa Rosa this year to build additional latrines. Furthermore, we are planning for our next international project.
Last summer, we built three latrines in Batey Santa Rosa and the locals were very excited about them. Over time, the use of these latrines will reduce contraction rates of fecal borne diseases such as round worm and cholera in the community. Our collaboration provides this community with the capacity to meet a basic human need, sanitation. The EWB team plans on returning to Batey Santa Rosa for an evaluation of the previously built latrines that the community constructed after our departure with the knowledge and skills we shared with them. By having the community construct latrines on their own, the EWB team is equipping the community with the skills to establish sanitation independence. This will make sure that the community is able to use our plans as we intended so that they may yield the maximum benefit from each latrine. After EWB’s final departure, the community will know the fundamentals of safe construction techniques and troubleshooting. They will be able to continue constructing sustainable latrines as needed in the future, allowing them to focus on other improvements that can better the lives of the people in their developing community.
Meanwhile, we are searching for our next project! We are excited about two opportunities which we are currently applying for. One is a water project in Honduras and the other is a bridge project in Nicaragua. The water project in Honduras would feature a water reservoir created by a dam and a piping system for a small community. The population of the community has increased exponentially, outpacing the amount of available water resources. Our task would be to improve the dam and piping system so that it would be able to meet the community’s new needs while respecting the environment. This project would fulfill our vision statement by “applying our knowledge of engineering in order to design and implement feasible solutions to improve the quality of life in third world countries”. This would be a great experience for both the community and our engineers. The project is a sizable undertaking and it would apply our members’ engineering abilities to the fullest extent.
A bridge project in Nicaragua is also an exciting opportunity. Completing it would greatly improve the lives of many Nicaraguans by allowing the children of the community to go to school during the rainy season, as well as allowing the efficient transport of goods during this season. This would help the engineers of EWB learn about one of the fundamentals of civil engineering: bridge design and construction.
As you can see, there are a lot of exciting things happening at Rose-Hulman EWB. We would love to have you be a part of it. Please contact our president, oliverr@rose-hulman.edu, for more information about our work.
