Engineers Without Borders

About the Chapter

Engineers Without Borders is a professional and student-run organization dedicated to helping local and international communities create sustainable, community-driven solutions in order to improve their quality of life. The chapter at the University of Massachusetts Amherst operates programs in Ghana and Kenya with the focus of developing clean, reliable, and convenient water infrastructure projects.

About the Programs

Both the Ghana and Kenya Programs are kicking off a fundraiser campaign to raise money to send our students overseas to help make a difference in these communities. We have spent the last year continuously planning by having weekly project meetings, meeting with faculty advisors, making conference calls with EWB USA, and communicating with our local contacts in order to find the best solution to help the people in these communities.  Sending a group of students overseas is no small task. We must raise the money for all of our trip expenses including plane tickets, local transportation, food and water, and supplies to implement our infrastructure projects. 

This is where we need your help! We have set up this MinuteFund with the goal of raising $7,500 to begin covering the cost of sending students to Africa to help provide water for these communities. 100% of your donation goes directly to the UMass Amherst EWB Chapter that will fund students traveling to Ghana and Kenya to do amazing work.

Want to learn more about our Projects?

Our programs have big plans to drill boreholes in early 2017 in their respective communities. We have been very busy preparing for the drilling. The Ghana Program will travel to Saviefe-Deme in May 2016 to locate the appropriate location of a borehole in their community. They will perform hydrogeological tests and geophysical tests in order to find the location that will produce a high-yielding borehole. During their recent trip, the Kenya Program performed hydrogeological testing to find a location with the best chances of a successful borehole. They applied and received the permits to drill this borehole from the local county Ministry of Water. Once the boreholes are drilled, our projects will develop and implement a pump system to extract the water from as much as 150 meters deep in the Earth to provide the growing communities with water even during the driest of months for years to come.

Fundraising Plan

We are pursuing other sources of fundraising to help us reach our goal. We have been actively researching and applying to grants from private and public organizations and contacting local NGOs and Rotary Clubs. We have already applied to grants from EWB-USA and the UMass Student Government Association and will also be applying to grants from organizations including Global Water Foundation, Coca-Cola Company, and many more.

For more about our projects, please visit us @ blogs.umass.edu/ewbumass/