Awesome Conference at UI-UC

Hey fellow EWB-ers and friends,

This weekend marks the one month anniversary of our voyage to the EWB conference hosted by Urbana-Champaign. Three of us made it out to Illinois this year (in thrifty college student fashion). The structure contained large lectures and smaller workshops, so we decided to divide and conquer as much as possible.

We all heard from distinguished EWB leaders like Frank Bergh and Peter Waugh as they illustrated where the organization is heading. Frank placed a large importance on every member of every chapter being conscious about their word choice concerning projects. We are not givers-- we are partners. The communities we work with are our partners, and we need to keep that in mind. Peter, on the other hand, outlined criteria for successful project implementation (similar to a rubric).

When it was time to breakout into smaller workshops we each chose a different topic pertinent to us. This way we managed to hit 3 of the 4-5 sessions and brought a little UC with us. Examples of these workshops included bio-sand filters, grant writing, project sustainability, and using personal style to achieve success.

Along our trip we also met up with a former EWB-UC member performing graduate work at the university there. He introduced us to his colleague and they showed us the impressive science labs and engineering facilities on campus, as well as some really interesting work they were performing.

All-in-all, the weekend was a great success as we each gained new skills and valuable contacts. As a new member to EWB, I loved this opportunity to get a small jump-start in understanding what this great organization is all about.

Pictures to come soon!

Thank You Bricks for Burere Supporters

EWB-UC Friends and Supporters,

Let me take a moment to thank you for your generous support of the University of Cincinnati Chapter of Engineers Without Borders. Your contribution to our most recent fundraising event, Bricks for Burere, has allowed us to take one step closer toward our funding needs for the Burere project. The people of Burere have been patiently waiting for our return to their community to begin construction. Through fundraising events like these, you allow our group to ensure our projects come to successful implementation as soon as possible. In its first year, Bricks for Burere raised $1,000 dollars towards the Burere School Project. This money alone will cover half of the expenses for masonry materials.

In December, our group will submit our Pre-Implementation form. This form details the entirety of the school projects, including: all design calculations, engineering and architectural drawings, project budget, material costs, and all the work that will be completed during the first phase of construction. Pending the success of this project submittal after our design is reviewed by a panel of professional engineers, we will traveling to break ground this coming March. The first trip goals will be to completely lay out the school site, dig out the foundation mold, and pour the concrete foundation.

Without your help and support, this project could never be realized. Thank you again for your contribution and all of us at EWB-UC thank you for your generosity!

Regards,

Mark Schutte

Vice President – External Affair, EWB-UC

Special thanks to Corporate Sponsors:

Consumer Solutions, Inc.

EMA Construction

Star Building Materials

Snazzy New EWB T-Shirts

This past Thursday EWB held its first T-shirt Printing Party of the school year. The party brought a great turnout,especially from our new EWBers, as well as great new T-shirt designs from our very own design committee. The new logo emphasized our chapter's work on water and school building projects.


Among the new things in EWB this year, we are also building a stronger relationship with the Orientation Board. The O-Board works with incoming freshmen to get them connected to student groups at UC. A better relationship with this group could allow us to reach out to incoming freshman as soon as possible and get them excited and involved in our cause. Be sure to stay posted on all the new EWB events to come.

EWB Kicks Off 2011-12 School Year

The UC 2011 school year has just begun and EWB-UC has already hit the ground running. Another school year brings new students, new ideas, and new vigor. This past week has seen the first general meeting and has brought a bunch of new and excited EWBers.

The new excitement surrounding this time of year brings immense potential for progress towards our projects. Look for more project specifics in the weeks to come.

EWB kicks off Bricks for Burere

As EWB-UC ramps up its efforts to begin implementation of its second major project, the organization hopes to close the gap in its monetary needs through a truly exciting event in Bricks for Burere.

What: A fundraising event to help raise money to build the walls of the Kingigoro Primary School in Burere, Tanzania. Most students currently learn in collapsing classrooms - or must have class outside due to an already collapsed classroom.

When: September 19th - October 16th (last day of Homecoming week), the "brick wall" will begin construction at the start of October.

Where: Lobby of the Rec Center (where the old smoothie stand used to be)

How: For every donation, a brick will be given to the donator to be decorated and returned to EWB to be placed in the wall. Pricing is as follows:

One Brick, Student = $2

One Brick, Non-Student = $5

Family Brick (4 Bricks) = $20

Student Organization Brick (3x3) = $30

**Families and Organizations can purchase another row/column of bricks for $20 per added dimension.

Companies are being contacted to match on campus support.

EWB cannot not wait to demonstrate the support and encouragement found in its own university through this event.

Be on the look out for EWB's wall!

June EWBer of the Month: Linea Olsson

Congratulations to Linea Olsson for being our June EWBer of the Month.

Linea just finished her first year in Chemical Engineering, and an actually international student from Sweden. She has definitely earned this award many times over, being one of our most active freshman in the group. She's shown incredible dedication and initiative, forming partnerships with the professional practice office and becoming one of our youngest exec board members.

Probably the best example of this initiative was Linea traveling on our recent Burere assessment trip to Tanzania. She helped perform crucial soil and material tests needed to move our school design forward. She also help gain final measurement data from the school site. Finally she interacted with members of the community and helped strengthen our partnership with Burere.We look forward to much more from Linea in the coming years.

Click here to see more photos of Linea from our Assessment Trip

Linea & Jim taking measurements inside the Burere school

A Successful Burere Assessment

EWB-UC is proud to have completed a very successful assessment trip for the Kingigoro primary school project in Burere, Tanzania. The information gathered on this trip will be vital for the review of the project this coming autumn. Pending approval and successful fundraising, the team hopes for approval to begin construction in Tanzania this coming winter.

A special thank you is in order for Tom Bible who, without having had a major role in the first stages of the project, offered to be our mentor on this trip. His help was immensely helpful as we gathered data and we are happy that he is interested in continued support of the design.

The trip was an amazing growing experience. I'm very happy that my term as president of EWB-UC could start with such a moving event in my life. I hope that everyone will keep up with Blueprints and http://ewb-uc.org/ this summer to hear some of the stories from the trip as well as news about the Burere project as it nears design completion. It feels great to be home, but the work to help the Burere community construct their new school continues!

May EWBer of the Month: Brittany Dexter

Congratulations to Brittany Dexter for being our May EWBer of the Month. Brittany worked hard as a member of the design committee to make all the materials we used at our banquet. From the invitations to the little table-tents, we got great feedback on how well everything was designed.

Especially important was Brittany's work on the EWB newsletter. She revised our design to fit with our national logo and helped give our newsletter the reboot that it needed. You can find our latest newsletter here. 

Also, congratulations for Brittany on graduating this year with her degree in Graphic Design from DAAP. Thanks Brittany, we wish you all the best!

EWB Banquet a Huge Success

Thank you to everyone who attended our Spring Banquet last Thursday. We received an incredible amount of positive feedback, and we're already looking forward to making it better for next year. We had notable speakers such as Provost Santa Ono and Student Body President Alan Hagerty attend and speak to the integral part EWB plays to UC. We also had our keynote speaker, Keith Zook, coordinator of P&G's Children's Safe Drinking Water Program demonstrate the power of clean water firsthand, using their PUR packets. After purifying muddy water to crystal-clear drinking water, members and our speakers made a toast using the newly cleaned water. (pictured above)

We also had several of our partners there, such as Chris Lewis, founder of Village Life Outreach Project and Raj Mehta, the director of UC's Honors Program. Finally, thanks to our faculty mentors and advisors; Dr. Dan Durbin for Burere, Dr. George Suckarieh from Burere, and Dr. Margeret Kupferle who is our dedicated organization advisor. On top of the countless hours they spend advising the group, it was great to have them attend our banquet.

Jim Moyer, our new president, also gave an overview of our future plans for EWB. You can view the whole presentation here. We talked about our upcoming trip to Burere in under 2 weeks, as well as our next trip scheduled for Winter of this year, where we plan to start construction of the Burere school. We also showed our plan for Nyambogo, with a final assessment trip and design selection planned within a year. Finally, we showed how we intend to transfer knowledge from Burere's school to Otho Abwao's and begin construction in Spring of 2012. We also highlighted new successes outside of our traditional projects, such as our new Future Cities after school tutoring program.


On top of all the presentations and speakers, we had some fun as well. We raffled off several prizes, both souvenirs from past EWB trips and shirts, scarves and blankets screen-printed with our EWB logo. We also had a delicious dinner and desert. (special thanks to Classic Fare catering for reducing the price per plate as a donation) In the end, we're incredibly excited that all the hard work we put into the event paid off. We've said it dozens of times, but thank you to everyone who attended and to all the EWBers for all the hard work you put in to make this happen. We look foraward to seeing you all here again at next year's banquet.

Click here to view all the Banquet photos

Last Chance to RSVP for Spring Banquet

The date of our spring banquet is fast approaching, if you haven't turned in your RSVP yet, or by our mistake, never received an invitation-don't worry, there's still time! Email banquet@ewb-uc.org right now to reserve your spot.

Our spring banquet will be held on May 26th in the Presidential Banquet Hall of Lindner Center at UC. The program will begin at 6:30pm and will consist of a catered dinner, speakers such as UC Provost, Dr. Santa Ono and Stundent Body President Alan Hagerty, and presentations by EWB members about project progress.

If you have primary-aged children, there will be a craft program run concurrently with the main banquet so the whole family can attend without worrying about a babysitter.

Whether you're a company or organization that has sponsored us, a professor or professional that has guided us, or a family or friend that has cheered us along the way, we want you to come to our banquet.

An $80 per plate donation is encouraged to cover the expenses of holding this event and help fundraise for our projects. If you're on facebook, you can also RSVP to the facebook event. But remember, the official RSVP is done by emailing banquet@ewb-uc.org.

Please include this information with your RSVP email

Number/Names of Adults

Number of Children

Donation Amount

Thank you and we hope to see you there!

Committee Updates

This week the Nyambogo Project Committee has two new advisors, Nalin Sahni and Todd Trabert. We are looking to have our alternative analysis for this project done by the end of the month and we are hoping to move into the design phase by the beginning of next year.
In the Burere Project Committee, we are looking to meet with Peter next week for our assessment form and getting ready for the summer assessment trip. We are slated to have this project implemented during the winter holiday next year.

The Banquet is swiftly approaching and with only 2 weeks left we are kicking it into high gear to get everything ready in time.
We are stepping it up in our Fundraising Committee as well. We are in the process of applying for a grant that will hopefully cover the cost of our Otho Abwao project. We are also working on business cards and donation boxes.

World Fest

On Thursday some of our EWB members went out to World Fest to spread the word about EWB and get our name out to potential members. Those in attendance enjoyed different foods from around the world, different styles of dancing such as mariachi dancing, and different cultural music. Thanks to everyone who came and supported EWB at World Fest.

April EWBer of the Month

Danny Watson a.k.a. Gigawatson is EWBer of the month for the month of April. Danny is a 3rd year Mechanical Engineering student here at UC. Last quarter Danny was off on Co-op in Detroit, but didn't hesitate to jump right back into things in EWB when he got back. Danny has been an amazing help in getting in contact with people for the banquet and helping out with other things in the Education Committee. Danny has also been highly involved in the Social and Recruitment Committee. Along with balancing his course load and his EWB activities, he still manages to perform at Baba Budan's on their Thursday night Open Mic Nights. Thanks for all of your help Danny!

Committee Chairs!

At our most recent meeting, the announcements were made for the appointed committee chairs for next year. Thanks to everyone who submitted an application and congrats to our new chairs!

Otho Abwao: Justin Thompson

Nyambogo: Mason Stout

Burere: Ben Gentry

Education: Max Poyle

Fundraising: Alex Jones

Social/Recruitment: Lana Sneath

Public Relations: Linea Olsson

Historian: Sidney Lacey

We're all looking forward to a great year with our committee chairs now in place!

Burere Assessment Trip

This week we finished up the Assessment forms and submitted them to EWB-USA for the trip this June with VLOP. We also added a few new members to help Avdhesh and the design team; Alex, who is a fifth year Civil student, and possibly a first year graduate student in structures will be joining us this week. We will continue to meet with THP to improve our design and get ready for the Implementation forms which we will be starting soon.

New Document Control Back Up

The Otho Abwao Skydrive folder has been overhauled and updated to include all relevant documents of the Otho Abwao Primary School project. The previous state of the folder was a mess, so it's great to see some organization implemented again to improve our documentation habits. The folder now features content organized into several main folders, with subfolders within each. Each folder contains a README file to describe the contents of the folder, as well as to provide contact information to direct questions regarding the folder's contents.

In the near future, the Otho Abwao Water Project folder will be overhauled to include all relevant documentation of the water project implemented in March 2009. These documents were previously stored on UC FileSpace, which has been abandoned due to difficulty in obtaining folder permissions for members.

A Weekend with Bill Clinton: CGIU 2011

The beginning of this month signaled a return of EWB-UC's representatives at one of the biggest youth leadership conference's in the United States - Clinton Global Initiative University (http://www.cgiu.org/meetings/2011/). This three day conference in San Diego aimed to bring together some of the world's youngest and most active philanthropists, innovators, and movement makers - the future NGO CEO's of the world. Sponsored by Bill Clinton and his foundation, the free conference (this year held at the University of California San Diego) played host to around 1,500 young men and women representing all 50 states and 90 countries. Mark Schutte and Jim Moyer, recently elected External Vice President and President of EWB-UC, both had the privilege of going to the conference in early April.

The conference consisted of large group panel discussions, followed by small breakout sessions and plenty of time for networking. "It was really an incredible experience - there were so many big names that came out to speak: the co-founder of Youtube, Sean Penn, Mandy Moore, Drew Barrymore, countless CEO's and policy makers, and of course, Bill Clinton himself," says Mark, "But really just being a part of such a huge group of people, all working towards some incredible commitments was the most rewarding part of the trip for me. It helps give me energy to go out and get to work on our EWB projects when I get to see all the great ideas others have come up with." Jim had a similar experience: "It was unbelievable how ingenious some of the commitments were. Jessica Matthews, presented her invention: the sOccket, a soccer ball that converts the kinetic energy used to kick it into electricity. Just 15 minutes of kicking creates 3 hours of light! Truly inspiring." (http://www.soccket.com/#!)

For all the hard work, Jim and Mark certainly were successful in networking with students and young adults from all over. They look forward to bringing back what they have learned to better serve EWB-UC and the UC community! Of course, not all their time spent was hard at work - San Diego's beach towns capped off the weekend beautifully!

A New Tradition: EWBer of the Month!

EWB has started something new and exciting! As of winter quarter, we’ve established EWBer of the Month. EWBer of the Month is chosen by the Exec board and has to be an outstanding member of the group. They must be outstanding in the fact that the work that they are doing is pushing their project, committee, and/or the group as a whole forward.

I am pleased to announce that we have already named two EWBers of the Month. The EWBer of the Month for February was Ryan Deffinger. Ryan has done a great deal with the External Affairs Committee. His work focused on fundraising for EWB on a very personal level and in doing so, he also recruited Dr. Ming Tang, a professor of an Architectural Design course in DAAP, to help revise and provide constructive criticism with the Otho Abwao and Burere schoolhouse schematics and blueprints. Ryan has also been seeking out companies for donations and sponsorship. Through personal connections and donations, Ryan has raised $676 for the group! He plans on continuing, and expanding upon, his efforts. Great job Ryan!

The EWBer of the Month for March is Avdhesh Gaur. As a graduate student from India studying Civil Engineering, Avdhesh is a very crucial member of the Burere Project. He has been working closely with THP and his work on the seismic and wind load calculations for the Burere school is extremely valuable for not only Burere, but for the entire group to use on future projects. Avdhesh has also been working on the structural design of the Burere school - another thing that will be very useful not only for Burere, but for projects to come! Keep the good work coming Avdhesh!

Congratulations again to these two gentleman. Keep up the outstanding work, our group wouldn’t be where it is now without you! Stay tuned for more EWBers of the Month!

New Exec Panel Elected

At our most recent meeting, we held elections for our upcoming year. Thanks to everyone who ran for positions and congrats to the following new members of the exec panel.



President: Jim Moyer
Vice President of Internal Affairs: Kevin Knollman
Vice President of External Affairs: Mark Schutte
Treasurer: Sarah Hrinko
Secretary: Morgen Schroeder

We also had a record number of applications for chair positions this year. Our new exec panel is reading over the applications and will be making appointments this Thursday.

UHA 5K Raising Funds for Burere

In what has been a long string of partnership with other organizations, EWB has secured the role of beneficiary for UHA PJ 5K. In what consistently is one of the funnest walk/runs held on campus, participants will show up in their favorite pair of pajamas, and run a 5k around UC's campus. (rated as one of Forbe's most beautiful campuses, so it also must be one of the most beautiful to run on)

Special thanks goes to everyone in the University Honors Association for all the hard work and planning they're putting into this event(special props go to the designer of the uber-cute poster). Details for the event are below, look for more info as the date approaches.

Day: Saturday, May 7th
Registration Time: 9:30am
Race Time: 10am

If you want to mark your digital calendar for this awesome event, click the button bellow: 

Otho Abwao Update

The AutoCAD drawings are taking form as we begin to document our preliminary structure. We have a first pass at the floor plan for a two-classroom building, and elevation drawings are next on the to-do list. The classrooms will each be 24'x27', as requested by the Otho Abwao Primary School administration. The ISSB wall is slated to be 6'' thick, and our confined masonry columns are sketched as 8''x8'' reinforced concrete columns. We might play around with the window and door placement, but this is a good first draft.

We're also getting ready for an organizational shift in leadership as elections for the 2011-2012 academic year approach. We're looking to shake things up a bit and restore some extra energy as we prepare to send off another trip to Tanzania in June to complete the Burere assessment. The quarter looks promising!

CCOSPE Awards Sponsorship

Friday, February 25th, the Cincinnati Chapter of the Ohio Society of Professional Engineers (CCOSPE) held a meeting at Montgomery Inn - Boathouse, cordially inviting students from EWB-UC. This was a tremendous opportunity for students to network with industry professionals, gain insights, and share knowledge.

During the evening's festivities it was announced that EWB-UC had been chosen as the recipient of this year's student sponsorship award. CCOSPE Treasurer, Pam Heckel, presented EWB-UC President, Vinny Travee, with a $1000 check, becoming a Silver Sponsor.

Travee and Burere Project Lead, Ben Gentry, graciously accepted the gift, sharing details of the group's latest workings and thanking CCOSPE for its continued support.

Date Auction Fundraiser Raises $1830

This past Friday was our date auction fundraiser. Students auctioned off the opportunity for a date to the highest bidder to raise money for EWB. In total, we raised $1830 for the Burere school project. 

This event topped off a full week of crazy events that made up EWeek, the week celebrating engineers. This year's superhero-themed EWeek had tug-of-wars, paper-airplane contests, skit competitions and more. EWB had 2 teams that competed as part of these events. 

A special thank you goes Engineering & Applied Science Tribunal for their work in planning the date auction and EWeek as a whole. Also, thanks to all the brave souls who got on the auction block for charity, and the generous benefactors who bought them!

Lights Out Fridays Going Strong

One of the several Education Committee Initiatives this year is Lights Out Fridays. Through Lights Out Fridays (LoF), EWB-UC members go around every Friday in the late afternoon and shut off lights left on in classrooms all around campus. The point in this program is an effort to change the energy culture at the University of Cincinnati. Lights left on on Fridays will probably be left on an entire weekend, wasting a lot of energy. If this is happening every week in classrooms all over campus, that can add up to quite an additional strain on UC's pocketbook. EWB students calculate the savings based on the amount of lights turned off, and we hope to submit a proposal to the University of Cincinnati at the end of the year, calling for installation of the motion sensing lights in classrooms across campus. This new equipment could easily be purchased with the money which UC has already saved from the EWB LoF team! This is exactly what EWB-UC stands for: sustainable solutions through partnership, that educate our community!

We like to have fun, too! Check out this great promotional video by two of our very own LoF leaders!

Summer Travelers Selected

After reading all the applications, we've selected our two travelers for the June assessment. Linea Olsson & Jim Moyer will represent EWB on our assessment in Burere. This assessment is focused on preparing all the final details necessary before school construction can start. We'll be bringing an updated memorandum of understanding to sign with the village council, and showing layout drawings of our proposed school. Linea & Jim will also be planning out water management necessary for concrete mixing on site, and securing building materials.

This trip will be part of a Village Life Outreach Project brigade. Along with representatives from EWB, UC med students will be traveling to conduct health clinics in VLOP's three communities. Students from the UC Honors Program will also be traveling on the brigade, as a culmination of a humanitarian design class taught by DAAP architect Michael Zaretsky. This multidisciplinary team will surely create an exciting and unique trip experience for all the travelers.

Jim is a 3rd year in Civil/Environmental Engineering originally from Toledo. He's currently EWB's internal vice president and has been since Spring of 2009. Jim has also worked closely on the Burere design since he first joined EWB during his freshman year. Jim's the person who schedules all of our great general meeting speakers, plus he oversees our project committees.

Linea is a freshman in Chemical Engineering who is actually an international student from Sweden. Linea has already gotten involved in both the Nyambogo committee and External Affairs. Through External Affairs, she's managed to forge connections with the co-op office (we're now presenting about EWB in Intro to Co-op classes) and Student Government(SG is currently investigating a bill that would make service-based travel eligible for UC International Grants based on their educational merit).

We're excited to have two great EWBers representing us on our assessment. As it gets closer to June, look for more updates on our trip.

EWB Hosting Invisible Children Screening

Last year, we hosted one of Invisible Children's road teams to screen their documentary.  This year, we're doing it again. IC is back with a brand new documentary that's more ambitious than ever and looking to get the word out.  The Invisible Children team will be coming hear to screen their new movie,"Tony" as part of their Congo tour.  This film will show the latest updates on IC's fight to end the LRA's reign of terror in Northeast Africa.

Our screening date is Thursday, April 21st in 525 Old Chem.  As the date approaches, we'll be releasing more details and advertising the event to all of UC.  As alway, the screening's free so bring all your friends!


If you have Google calendar, you can add the event right now by clicking the button below.

Future Cities First Meeting a Success!

The Engineers Without Borders After School Program, Future Cities, just completed its first meeting - and what a blast! This week there were about twenty 3rd to 8th graders that participated. We really just wanted to get to know the kids, so today we talked about recycling and tried to as learn as many names as possible. As you can see from the picture, we made recyclable name tags. As a group, we still have a lot to learn about working with younger kids, but we are so excited to do it! Stay tuned for more Future Cities news - if you are interested in our program, or would like to help, contact Mark Schutte and schuttmp@gmail.com.

Nyambogo to be Sponsored by Global Fast

Global Fast is an new non-profit that connects people with worthwhile causes, while changing the way they think about donating.  While most nonprofits only ask you to give up part of your paycheck, Global Fast advocates for sacrificial giving. By giving something up, whether a meal, a movie, or that new t-shirt you've been wanting to buy, you now have money in your budget to donate instead, building solidarity with those we aim to help.

Our Nyambogo water project has been vetted by the Global Fast staff and selected as one of the benificiary projects.  Members of the UC community, including the service fraternity Alpha Phi Omega & University Honors Association, will be partnering with EWB to run a Global Fast at UC.  In the coming weeks, look for events and other publicity aimed to engage all of UC in this fast, all earning money for Nyambogo's new water system.

 Click here to visit the Nyambogo project page on GlobalFast.org

Screen Print is ready for Future Cities!

Hey everybody!

Local outreach is new to EWB-UC. Currently, the Education Committee (a new section of our chapter) has completed talks with William Howard Taft Elementary. We are officially one of their weekly after school programs! And what are we doing, do you ask? This after school program is going to focus around the pillars of our group, but also around a national competition - Future Cities (http://www.futurecity.org/). This national competition for 6th, 7th, and 8th graders challenges students to envision their ideal city of the future. Many schools from around the nation will compete in regional competitions which must showcase a digital rendering of the city, an engineering report, and the presentation of a scale 3D model of a section of the city! We are very excited to have our first ever Future Cities after school program meeting this Tuesday, February 1st. To better help the students recognize us, we will all have program shirts to wear to every meeting. EWB uses an interesting style of t-shirt printing - sustainable and creative, of course! Screen printing, just as was used with our EWB chapter shirts, gives us a template which can be used over and over - and we can choose as many color combinations as we'd like!

Look for posts on progress of Future Cities: Sustainable Design By Children, EWB's first ever after school program initiative in the near future!

Otho Abwao Status

Hello All!

As we enter the meat of the winter quarter, the Otho Abwao project is looking forward to exciting progress. Our team has been hard at work defining and selecting building concepts and rendering them in Solidworks. Exciting progress from last quarter saw the arrival of several informative documents from Kenya, including example technical drawings from a local contractor and a set of public school classroom regulations per the Kenyan Ministry of Education. These documents will aid us greatly this quarter as we continue design work.

We have made our final concept choices and will spend the next few months forming our specifications. This will entail fully-defined CAD drawings, load calculations, written specifications, and the like. We are working to partner with the Walsh Group, a construction management contracting company, to obtain assistance with our CAD drawings. Our next step is to present our initial models to the Walsh Group and begin more exact CAD drawings in order to spec out the foundation and walls. We're always looking for more engaged team members, so feel free to come out to any EWB gathering and see what we're all about!

Progress in Nyambogo

Greetings! Over the last quarter and break the members of the Nyambogo design project have been hard at work. Last quarter's attendance at our committee meetings was incredible and the extra help has been quite a boost to the project. We're currently fully invested in determining the best solution for the water storage that will be part of our design. Last quarter we evaluated boreholes and water catchments as the two most feasible sources. Water catchment was given second priority due to its limited ability to supply during the dry season. This drawback would require massive storage capacities in order to ensure availability during the dry season. The borehole offers year round water availability, so the amount of water storage required at any one time would be greatly reduced. This quarter's work involves investigation of types of tanks from large ferrocement tanks to smaller prefabricated plastic tanks. Spring quarter will focus on the incorporation of filter technology as well as planning distribution sites throughout the community.

Burere Update

Over the break the Burere project has been looking over documentation from VLOP and researching information about materials, building techniques, and the government in Tanzania. Before break we contacted THP Limited, Inc. to help us with the structural issues with our first design. This quarter we will be continuing to communicate with THP and figure out exactly what we need to do on the assessment trip this summer.