ASU engineering students are building medical clinics and wind turbines for social development projects in third-world countries as part of their homework for the second year in a row.
Engineering Projects in Community Service, also known as EPICS, is a program based around three one-credit-hour classes, which can be taken consecutively, that connect engineering students with domestic and international projects, said Richard Filley, director of EPICS.
The program added 11 new projects at the beginning of the fall semester in addition to the seven that were started last year, he said.
Last year the program earned five out of the 16 available Innovation Challenge awards, a grant offered by ASU that rewards students who present possible solutions to social problems.
These grants provided $2,000 for each team to continue developing its ideas, Filley said.
He said he attributed the program’s success to the students’ creative problem solving.
“We concentrate on fresh thinking, new ideas and innovation,” Filley said.
The classes more than doubled from 35 students last fall to 72 students this year, he said.
Filley said he expects the program to grow, but also wants to maintain the quality of the program.
“I want this to be a life-changing experience,” he said.
Students in the program are working on designing a variety of systems to be used domestically and internationally. These include designing lightweight wind turbines and generators that run on rainfall to power the medical clinics in the small African country of Malawi, Filley said.
The Malawi medical clinics project, which transforms shipping containers into medical clinics, is aimed at serving women of Malawi, who have one of the highest maternal death rates in the world, said Susanna Young, one of the team members on the project.
In order to transform the shipping containers, the team of students from different majors and levels of study must design the ventilation, power systems and lighting that can be completely generated by wind and solar power, she said.
The teams hope to create a prototype by April, but it is doubtful the unit will be taken to Malawi immediately, Young said, because that is during their rainy season and it is difficult to set up the unit.
The Malawi medical clinic project, which started last year, will continue for future classes. Some of those working on the project last year have returned, while a few new members have been added to the group, she said.
After the first clinic is set up, the students will be able to tailor their designs for the future clinics based on the feedback from the villagers, she said.
Young said she might continue with similar projects after she graduates.
“Engineering is ideal to address a lot of the needs around the world,” she said.
Louis Tse, a mechanical engineering senior and another member of the Malawi medical clinic project said in an e-mail that the design of the containers is flexible to fit specific needs.
“It is our goal to develop a design that shows container clinics are a viable option, and encourages others to spread them to other areas in need,” Tse said.
The engineering program tries to consider the cultural elements in all of its projects to broaden its effectiveness, he said.
“Our program is successful because it's so rich in the human element,” Tse said.
Many of these projects are interdependent. For example, the wind turbines and generators may be used to power the containers when they are transformed into clinics because they will be used in rural areas where the access to fuel for electricity is limited, Filley said.
In addition, students are using the same kind of shipping containers to design promotional exhibits for project C.U.R.E, the Commission on Urgent Relief and Equipment, a non-governmental organization that provides donated medical supplies to third-world countries, he said.
Guests at the C.U.R.E exhibit will explore how the organization changes the lives of people in third-world countries with hands-on exhibits of the outdated or poorly made medical supplies C.U.R.E. replaces and videos of individual people that the organization benefits, Filley said
Another EPICS team is working on improving the contaminated water supply at Rahima Hoque Chetonabikash Girls College in Bangladesh, giving the school more clean water and power than it needs so it can eventually sell the excess to their village, Baherchar Barakanda, he said.
This is meant to empower them with business skills, Filley said.
Reach the reporter at mary.shinn@asu.edu
