An Effective Academic Construct for International Humanitarian Projects in Engineering Education

There are numerous examples of university-based engineering service learning projects that are executed in developing countries as part of “real world” experiential learning. Such projects and programs are designed to have dual benefit, both educational (for the student) and humanitarian (for the developing country recipients). However, well-intentioned service learning efforts oftentimes achieve experiential education objectives, but fall short on humanitarian benefit due to some common pitfalls. First, the best design for an educational experience may run contrary to the best design for humanitarian benefit. In the end, for an academic institution, the educational experience usually prevails. Oftentimes, candid conversations with “end users” are difficult to arrange and thus true user needs may be difficult to discern. As well, there can be ‘temptations’ to incorporate technologies that demonstrate integration of engineering skills, but may not be appropriate or affordable for the end users. Second, there tends to be a lack of requisite project expertise ‘outside engineering’ on engineering project teams. Humanitarian projects require an interdisciplinary team for successful design and implementation, oftentimes calling upon knowledge of culture, government, religion and local politics. Third, projects in academia revolve around the academic calendar. Student teams form, design solutions state-side, implement them in-country and then move on to other coursework and graduate. Projects that require a multi-year effort have continuity challenges because a large fraction of the repository of knowledge and experience created by the project goes with the students. Finally, student projects implemented in-country need follow-up and follow-through after the project team leaves the country to be successful. A strong relationship with an in-country partner is needed to maintain projects in the field and give feedback on performance for later efforts. We propose a sequence of 3 project phases to address most, if not all, of the aforementioned pitfalls in education-based international humanitarian engineering project work. In Phase I, projects are first introduced in the context of an engineering service learning course to students who are juniors or seniors in their courses of study. Perceived humanitarian needs are gathered from the field by an in-country partner or NGO with which the university maintains strong, year-round contact. The needs are communicated to these service learning teams who produce prototype solutions. The aim of the prototype is to demonstrate the feasibility in-country in a “protected environment” that allows the gathering of a large amount of data without risk to basic needs of the end users. Phase II involves a multi-disciplinary senior capstone design team taking a successful prototype design from Phase I and producing a pilot design that is implemented in an ‘end-user environment’ in-country. Finally, Phase III involves another multi-disciplinary capstone design team working with an in-country business partner to “seed a business” around the scale-up of the pilot. The Ohio State University (OSU) College of Engineering is engaged with an in-country partner, World Gospel Mission (WGM), in Choluteca, Honduras, from which it learned that there is considerable dietary insufficiency in rural Central America. As a solution, an aquaponics system (combining aquaculture and hydroponics) was proposed with the aim of improving food security for rural Hondurans by providing a sustainable system that can supplement diets with indigenous fish and vegetables year-round. In the first year, a prototype aquaponics system was designed and constructed at a vocational school in Honduras operated by WGM by an OSU engineering service learning team. Over the ensuing year, the vocational school gathered and fed back data and experience with the system as a part of their education. After a successful demonstration of the feasibility of the concept in Phase I, an interdisciplinary senior capstone design team is now tasked with refining the concept in Phase II to create a pilot design that they will install using local materials and labor in a poor rural community with which WGM has a significant relationship. Specifically, the pilot unit involves re-designing the prototype to make it more affordable and responsive to the voiced needs of the pilot community, while giving consideration for an eventual design that will be installed and maintained as part of a sustainable business by local Hondurans in Phase III. The OSU College of Engineering is presently testing the validity of the outlined 3-part construct for education-based international humanitarian engineering project work. We hope to show that it facilitates effective execution and delivery of humanitarian engineering solutions while providing powerful experiential components in an engineering education.