San Diego State’s Engineers Without Borders hosted a fundraiser Saturday, Feb. 27 at the Francis Parker School, Linda Vista Campus, where they raised nearly $4,800 for water infrastructure in Nicaragua.
The fundraiser was for their two current projects, one in Nicaragua and the other with the Mesa Grande Band of Mission Indians. While the event was geared toward raising money to send four or five students to Agua Fria, Nicaragua this upcoming summer, any leftover money will go to their local project in Santa Ysabel.
EWB is sending the students to Nicaragua for the assessment phase of a five-year plan to build a solar-powered water pump and distribution system for the village of Agua Fria. The village’s underground water source is 3 kilometers away over a steep hill and requires significant time and effort to transport.
On this first trip over the summer, the students will be gathering data and information about the terrain and the village. Once they have all the necessary data, they can begin working on plans for the actual water pump. The pump itself will be built in Agua Fria with the help of the villagers.
The project comes with a five-year contract. Throughout the process, EWB will be assisted by GRID Alternatives, a nonprofit organization that assists in the implementation of solar panels and other energy efficiencies for low-income families. The company will match 15 percent of all funds raised for the project.
A major part of the project is training the villagers how to use the equipment and fix the water pump. EWB USA will not let the SDSU chapter out of the contract at the end of the five years if they have not demonstrated the village has the knowledge to take care of the water pump.
“Our projects have an emphasis on community-based service,” said Ethan Palm, president of EWB. “It sounds weird and counterintuitive, but we’re trying to minimize our involvement and we’re trying to make ourselves less of a fundamental part of it. We want it to be 50-50, us and the community, so the community has a really good understanding on what’s going on.”
The project manager, the project lead international and two health and safety officers will go on the trip.
“They need an easily accessible source of water and I think we have the skills to give them that and that’s important,” project lead international Alex Garabedian said. “Just having water easily accessible, and it’s clean, that could reduce all kinds of health problems. It could really change their lives.”
Michael Summers, an SDSU alumnus with a bachelor’s in fine art, did a live painting that was auctioned off at the recent EWB event. The painting of two penguins under an umbrella shielding them from colorful raindrops was sold for $4,100 to a collector in Germany, with all of the proceeds going to EWB.
“I’m pretty excited about the chance to be able to give a little bit, do some good,” Summers said. “I’m really glad that there is an organization like Engineers Without Borders that’s running around and looking for these kinds of problems that need to be solved and reaching out, organizing these kinds of events. It’s important.”
EWB estimates the trip this summer will cost $3,200, with the remainder of the money from this event being put into their funds for use on their domestic project and later trips to Nicaragua.
