dkjglksdjg

Engineers Without Borders:

SUNY-ESF Student Chapter

2014 Year Report

SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry

2014 Issue 3

Page|1

SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry’s

Engineers Without Borders Student Chapter (ESF-

EWB) is a group of over eighty engineers, scientists,

landscape architects and environmental scholars with an

interest in international development. Group members

devote their time and energy to help the chapter build

sustainable infrastructure abroad while also increasing

domestic awareness of the needs of people in the

developing world. The rewards for these sacrifices will

be threefold: joy when the project is completed,

education on the principles of sustainable engineering

design, and experience gained while working with

fellow ESF-EWB members, professionals, and other

student organizations and EWB chapters.

EWB-USA MISSION

TABLE OF CONTENTS

“EWB-USA is a nonprofit humanitarian organization

established to support community-driven development

programs worldwide through partnerships that design

and implement sustainable engineering projects, while

creating transformative experiences that enrich global

perspectives and create responsible leaders.”

About ESF-EWB 1

EWB-USA Mission 1

Letter from the President 2

ESF-EWB Officers and Mentors 2

Honduras 3

Guatemala 4

Sponsors and Collaborators 5

ABOUT ESF-EWB

2014 Issue 3

Page|2

LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT

Thomas Decker Alex Caven Kurt Dirr Taylor Brown Becky Meissner President Treasurer Web Master Honduras Project Lead Tyler Pitts Jeremy Driscoll Kristina Macro Douglas Reymore Haley Canham Guatemala Project Leads Vice President USA Representative Report Editor

Dr. Theodore Endreny Mark Fabian PhD, PE, PH MS, Past PCV Faculty Advisor Honduras Technical Mentor

ESF-EWB OFFICERS AND MENTORS

At SUNY-ESF, I often find myself in awe,

entirely inspired and captured by the passion

that drives the students around me. That

passion that surrounds our campus becomes

even stronger within our club, providing

drive and motivation to better the world.

Through engineering and the encompassing

social practices, we are able to do just that;

following the hurdles, struggles, and failures

we are bound to experience given the nature

of development projects. With our skillful

mentors, leading advisors, and generous

sponsors we have been successful in

overcoming project challenges and have

made significant progress in our projects in

Honduras and Guatemala.

The 2013-2014 year marks the 11th

anniversary of the establishment of our

organization, an impressive feat of student,

faculty, and professional dedication to

improving the world. I am excited to share

this newsletter which showcases our club’s

work over the past year. I hope you enjoy

the read and consider reaching out to us to

learn more or how to support us in our

projects.

Sincerely,

Thomas J. Decker

President 2014-2015

2014 Issue 3

Page|3

In August 2014, students Thomas Decker

and Taylor Brown were led by Professor

Ted Endreny to Buena Vista, Honduras to

continue a project that the ESF-ESS club

has been working on since 2007. The

purpose of the trip was to meet with the

people in the community and their water

board to sign a new Memorandum of

Understanding (MOU), evaluate any repairs

the system needed, and to begin each of the

eight tasks left before 100% completion.

Before the project started, the community’s

source of water came from a precarious

system of rubber hoses that were prone to

leaks and contamination.

The gravity-fed water filtration and

distribution system implemented by ESS has

provided approximately 45 families with a

clean reliable source of water in their

households for drinking, bathing, cooking

and laundry.

The project was designed to be sustainable,

in that the people of the community, could

eventually take full ownership of the system

and be able to maintain the system without

financial dependence on ESS. The

community helped greatly during

implementation and learned how the system

works so that they could perform routine

maintenance. The establishment of the water

board was critical for the long-term success

of the project. Giving people in the

community leadership roles allows them to

be mobilizers of their community and gives

them a sense of pride. Another important

factor to the success of this project is the

partnership formed with the non-

governmental organization (NGO) Alfalit.

They have helped maintain contact with the

community, organized the purchase of

materials and equipment, contracted labor,

scheduled meetings, and carried out actual

implementation.

This project has faced many challenges,

which has delayed completion. Delivering

materials for implementation was difficult

during the rainy seasons. Funding was also

lost in 2009 when Honduras faced a coup

d’etat and the club needed to find alternate

funding.

After the trip this past August, the final

funds were received by the community to

finish the distribution system. As of October

2014, all tasks proposed in the MOU have

been completed and the implementation

phase of the project is finished. The next

steps are to complete assessment of the

project over the course of 2015, and to move

forward with project closeout.

HONDURAS

BY TAYLOR BROWN

ESF-ESS STUDENTS TRAVEL TO HONDURAS TO FINISH POTABLE WATER SUPPLY PROJECT

2014 Issue 3

Page|4

Beginning in May 2014, ESF-ESS began

partnering with the Syracuse Professional

Chapter of Engineers Without Borders’

(EWB) project in Guatemala. The club’s

mission is to improve health and quality of

life in developing countries, through

sustainable engineering practices. The

specific goal for this project is to work with

a community to improve sanitation and

hygiene through improved latrines. An

initial trip in May 2014, included discussing

details of the project with community

leaders and identifying a site for latrines.

Our trip consisted of three professional

engineers and four students, three of whom

are ESF-ESS members.

We traveled to Las Majadas, a community

of 400 students and their families near the

Santa Maria volcano in Guatemala. The

water system in Las Majadas is unreliable,

overall hygiene is inadequate, and sanitation

principles are not well understood.

GUATEMALA

We met with a Peace Corps volunteer and a

health care worker, both working in Las

Majadas, to help with translation and to gain

a better understanding of the community’s

needs. The community already has

composting toilets, but they are a very basic

design and most are near the end of their

useful life. The project aims to develop a

latrine design that will last longer and be

more hygienic to use. During our trip, we

collected soil and surveying data at each

location to better compare our three

proposed toilet designs. We met with

students, parents, and community leaders to

get input on our designs to facilitate human

centered design.

We are currently working on an alternatives

analysis for an ideal latrine design. We are

excited to continue to work with the

Syracuse Professional Chapter and the

community of Las Majadas into the future.

BY JEREMY DRISCOLL

COLLABORATION WITH THE SYRACUSE PROFESSIONAL EWB CHAPTER

2014 Issue 3

Page|5

SPONSORS AND COLLABORATORS

You can make a donation/sponsorship by check, which can be sent to: SUNY-ESF Cashier’s Office

102 Bray Hall 1 Forestry Drive

Syracuse, NY 13210

Sponsorship Categories Gold - $1,000

Silver - $500

Bronze - $250

Please make checks payable to SUNY-ESF with Engineers Without Borders in the memo

As a 501(c)(3) non-profit, all donations to ESF-EWB are tax deductible

HOW TO DONATE

2014 Issue 3

Page|6

Engineers Without Borders

SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry

For more information, please contact ESF-EWBSS at esfewbsd@gmail.com

Find us on Facebook as SUNY ESF Engineers Without Borders

Or check out our website at www.esf.edu/org/ewb

A special thank you to all our writers!