Student chapter of Engineers Without Borders dispatches to rural village to build invention that replaces open-fire cooking

Rodrigues, Jill

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Students Engineer Solution to Public Health Issue in Dominican Republic

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Roger Williams UniversityDOCS@RWUFeatured News Story The Week at Roger3-16-2016Students Engineer Solution to Public Health Issuein Dominican RepublicJill RodriguesRoger Williams UniversityFollow this and additional works at: https://docs.rwu.edu/weekatroger_featured_newsPart of the Higher Education CommonsThis News Article is brought to you for free and open access by the The Week at Roger at DOCS@RWU. It has been accepted for inclusion in FeaturedNews Story by an authorized administrator of DOCS@RWU. For more information, please contact mwu@rwu.edu.Recommended CitationRodrigues, Jill, "Students Engineer Solution to Public Health Issue in Dominican Republic" (2016). Featured News Story. 606.https://docs.rwu.edu/weekatroger_featured_news/606 News ArchiveStudents Engineer Solution to Public Health Issue inDominican RepublicStudent chapter of Engineers Without Borders dispatches to rural village to buildinvention that replaces open- re cookingMarch 16, 2016 Jill Rodrigues '05Valle Nuevo, Dominican Republic – For their inaugural service project, Roger Williams University’sEngineers Without Borders student club traveled deep into the mountains of northern DominicanRepublic last week to provide a design solution for a serious public health issue.Their task was to replace open- re cooking – which has been causing chronic respiratory illness inwomen and children in Valle Nuevo – with an inexpensive, e cient method that channeled smokeoutdoors. It was an e ort that kicked o  last fall via the Foundation for International Medical Relief ofChildren (FIMRC), which matched the club’s expertise to a community need at one of the nonpro t’sproject sites around the globe.The group had spent months designing improvements to a traditional wood-burning cook stove andtesting full-scale prototypes at the homes of club members. Now, prepared to put boots on the groundand launch their invention,  ve of the group’s students – engineering majors Briana Tremblay, AndrewDelSanto, Stephanie Gratiano, Madison Newton and Yazmeen Shahin – dispatched into the  eld,accompanied by faculty advisors, to raise their concept from theory to application in the real world.“This wasn’t a case of volunteers going in and just doing whatever they wanted to do,” according toTremblay, president of Engineers Without Borders and a mechanical engineering junior. “FIMRC hadidenti ed the need from the community, and we had a lot of help and input along the way from thelocals.”Each day for a week, they’d depart from their host families in Restauración to journey by truck into therural mountain village composed of wood-and-tin-roof houses set along a two-mile dirt road. Furnishedwith their requested materials by FIMRC, the students were prepared to lead work teams withassistance from the local Dominicans and Haitians. From the start, they ran into challenges they hadn’t encountered back home. The aluminum for thechimneys came in sheets and had to be stapled into tubes. The sand was much grainier than they wereused to, which required adding water and cement mixture in order to get the bricks to adhere. Andwhen a local man informed them that the rainy season would douse the cook- res through thechimney, Tremblay said the students devised a “birdhouse-like” cap that covered the chimney hole butallowed smoke to escape through the sides.“This project gave us the opportunity to apply our knowledge in the  eld,” said Madison Newton, ajunior civil engineering major. “In the  eld, in a foreign country, you have to solve things on your own –you can’t rely on teachers to tell you what to do. It not only shows you what you’ll be facing in the work eld, but also what you’ll experience in real life.”As they built eight cook stoves throughout the week, the students immersed themselves in thecommunity, playing soccer and tossing a rugby ball – three students are on the RWU Women’s ClubRugby Team – with the local children; experiencing the local cuisine; and working with regionaltradesmen and FIMRC representatives to teach them how to construct their design. Even the childrenhad a hand in the project, taking up a trowel to spread cement and laying brick for the stove base.For the student-engineers, the most meaningful part of the project – which was a volunteer e ort andnot undertaken for academic credit – was the community involvement. They le  behind illustratedinstructions and material to build an additional cook stove.“This was an experience that not only enhances your education through real, hands-on work, but youalso learn so much about yourself and grow as a person,” Tremblay said. “We did this project forourselves and for the community of Villa Nuevo.”

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Students Engineer Solution to Public Health Issue in Dominican Republic

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