Jodi Gentry, left, doctoral student in environmental engineering, levels materials while building latrines in Bolivia. Mary Adams, right, assisted in constructing the eco-friendly building. KU students have visited the community three times since May 2008.
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
This morning, graduate students Emily Robbins, of Overbrook, and Jodi Gentry, of Topeka, packed knapsacks with rain gear, sleeping bags and photographs — tools and gifts to accompany them on their long journey ahead.
The two graduate students and two advisers are returning to Bolivia to check in on some old friends in Azacilo, an Aymaran village of 200 with little to no access to clean water or sanitation. At least that’s the case for the time being.
During the next few years, members of the KU chapter of Engineers Without Borders will work to install 27 latrines, one for each Aymaran family. The students also plan to help drill a well to provide more access to clean water. KU students have visited the community three times and helped install seven latrines since May 2008. They plan to visit again next spring and summer.
This time, Robbins and Gentry will be gone for six days. Three of those days will be spent sleeping on the tile floor of the only schoolhouse with the only light bulb in the village while they survey the progress and success of the latrines. They won’t shower while they’re in the village.
Group Info
The KU chapter of Engineers Without Borders relies solely on fundraising to finance trips to Azacilo. The next fundraiser involves pledges for the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty. Members of EWB will collect pledges over the next two weeks to participate in a 30-hour hunger strike, lasting from 1 p.m. Oct. 21 to 7 p.m. Oct. 22. Those interested in donating can visit www.EWB-KU.org for more information.
“I’m looking forward to seeing how things are going,” Robbins said.
Gentry has been on every trip to the Aymaran community so far.
“I’ve started to realize that they’re just like everyone else,” she said. “Their families are the most important things to them. Their culture is different, but still the same.”
Azacilo is located in the Andes Mountains, 90 miles northwest of La Paz, an area once inhabited by the Incas. The other is Haiti.
Before the KU chapter arrived, the Aymaran used the ground for a toilet, exposing children and other members of the community to human waste that mixed with the mud and soil throughout the village. Many of the families don’t have access to safe water and there are no shower facilities.
“This has showed me that you don’t just have to design huge bridges and really complex systems for people,” Robbins said. “Here, you can use your skills to help other people who don’t have the basic necessities.”
Craig Adams, chair of the civil, environmental and architectural engineering department with the University, said a follow-up visit to the community is one of the more crucial aspects to the success of their efforts.
“Where most sanitation efforts fail worldwide is in their implementation,” he said. “Very often technologies are built and then not used properly.”
He said improper use and neglect came from lack of education, lack of understanding and lack of maintenance.
The latrines EWB-KU built are also more complicated than a hole in the ground. Known as compostable latrines, these systems are designed to capture human waste and turn it into high-quality compost.
For one year, a family fills up one cell with human waste, grass and leaves. After the year is up, the family removes the cell and stores it for another year, while using a second cell. Once the first cell has stored for a year, the family can remove the contents and use it as compost to grow turnips, carrots, potatoes and maize. Composting for a second year creates a much better and safer compost for use on food crops, Adams said.
“We don’t want to just give something to this community,” Lara Pracht, Garden City senior, said. “We want to empower them to be able to do a project like this in the future so that at some point, when we do leave, the projects don’t just fail.”
Adams, along with Pracht, Gentry, Robbins and nine other KU students, spent the month of June installing six latrines and connecting with the community. Community members built the seventh latrine after the group had left.
“We’ve spent a lot of time with these people and sort of feel connected to these people and feel obligated to help,” Pracht, EWB-KU president, said. “We promised them these things and want to follow up on that.”
Pracht said participating in the EWB confirmed her desire to use her engineering degree to help people in need.
“I don’t want to be stuck in an office working on a little piece of some project when I can hopefully be part of something bigger and be part of something that actually affects people’s lives more so than just designing another building,” she said.
J.P. Bornholdt, St. Louis senior and vice president of EWB-KU, also went to help in Azacilo in December and June. He said he received as much from the Aymaran as they got from him.
“They have a really good grasp on what’s important to value and are very grateful for every day of life,” he said. “I think that it’s equally important that we bring them clean water as to bring back that sort of mentality to the United States.”
— Edited by Betsy Cutcliff
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