{"id":126954,"date":"2022-07-12T09:45:11","date_gmt":"2022-07-12T13:45:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/?p=126954"},"modified":"2022-10-27T15:08:46","modified_gmt":"2022-10-27T19:08:46","slug":"uganda-water-and-the-engineer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/2022\/07\/12\/uganda-water-and-the-engineer\/","title":{"rendered":"Uganda, water and the engineer"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

John Wilke, a biomedical engineering major, and other members of Wright State\u2019s chapter of Engineers Without Borders traveled to Kabingo, Uganda, to assess how to renovate washrooms and latrines at a school.<\/p><\/div>\n

When the academic year ended in April, Wright State University students generally were off to internships, vacations or back to classes. John Wilke did none of those. He went to Uganda to help the health of people in a small village.<\/p>\n

And he\u2019s going back next year to help finish what was started.<\/p>\n

Wilke (the \u201ce\u201d is pronounced) is a Kettering native who is a rising senior and a biomedical engineering major<\/a> in the College of Engineering and Computer Science<\/a>. He started his academic journey at Columbus State Community College, attracted by the small class sizes.<\/p>\n

After two years, he transferred to Wright State, allured by the biomedical engineering program and the opportunities the university offers. \u201cI always liked the medical field,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

While medical school and patient care weren\u2019t in his plans, he is fascinated by the engineering that goes into medical equipment, everything from a heart valve to prosthetics to imaging devices.<\/p>\n

The opportunity he found outside of classes was Wright State\u2019s chapter of Engineers Without Borders, a national organization with branches on scores of other campuses. The Denver-based Engineers Without Borders partners with communities around the world to meet basic human needs.<\/p>\n

One of those basic needs is clean water for drinking and sanitation. Engineers Without Borders\u2019 Greater Cincinnati Professional Chapter conducted a massive clean water project for the small Ugandan village of Kabingo.<\/p>\n

Wright State\u2019s chapter of Engineers Without Borders joined the project in 2019 to renovate sanitation-related facilities. Wilke had heard of Wright State\u2019s chapter.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was curious. I found Engineers Without Borders interesting as a service group,\u201d he said. \u201cI was attracted to the fact that you can practice engineering concepts in a way that helps people. I thought that honestly, I would have no other opportunity to go to Uganda to do an engineering project.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wilke is quick to point out that the engineering involved is civil, not biomedical. However, adventure, service and benevolence appealed to him.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

John Wilke and other students in Wright State\u2019s Engineers Without Borders chapter will return to Kabingo, Uganda in 2023 to help work on the sanitation project.<\/p><\/div>\n

Most recently, from May 17 to 28, Wilke was among a small group from Wright State that traveled to Kabingo to assess what needed to be done and how to meet those needs.<\/p>\n

Wright State is working with St. Bakhita\u2019s Secondary School to improve sanitation and washrooms. Wilke said an earlier Wright State Engineers Without Borders team \u201cbuilt two large hand-washing stations for the school, which has helped. But their latrines are in bad shape and require renovation and ventilation due to constant smell. We are also working on renovating their washrooms. One of the issues with their washrooms is poor drainage leading to standing water. Malaria is one of their main issues and standing water brings the mosquitos.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the fall, the students will work with local Ugandan contractors to develop plans to address those concerns, including renovating the latrines and washrooms and creating a construction schedule.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, Wilke and the Engineers Without Borders chapter will raise funds in Dayton for the project. Fundraising has been ongoing \u2014 Wilke spoke at a fundraising dinner hosted by the chapter in March at the Wright State University Nutter Center to explain the village\u2019s plight and what he and the other chapter members are doing to help.<\/p>\n

Wilke said he and other students in the chapter will return to Kabingo sometime in 2023 to help work on the improvements.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo get the opportunity to manage a project like this is awesome,\u201d Wilke said. \u201cTo talk with community members, diagnose what they need and what\u2019s feasible. Drawing up plans, creating a budget, fundraising, creating a schedule.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

John Wilke is fascinated by the engineering needed to develop and build medical equipment.<\/p><\/div>\n

He adds, \u201cThis is a far cry from what I\u2019ll do as a biomedical engineer, but there\u2019s some professional development that\u2019ll help, and yes, there\u2019s personal growth in this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wilke is quick to acknowledge the university\u2019s help. \u201cWright State has been supportive of our chapter,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re willing to work with us in whatever we might need, including helping post fundraiser links.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added that the chapter\u2019s ranks thinned during the pandemic, when many students stayed away from campus and turned to virtual visits instead.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have maybe 12 or 13 active members. COVID cut into our numbers. We had about 25 students who actively attended meetings,\u201d he said. \u201cThis year we hope we can drive up recruitment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Turning back to Kabingo, Wilke said, \u201cThe community there is amazing. It\u2019s beautiful. They live on wide-open lands miles from the closest river. It\u2019s a very communal culture. Kids walk an hour or two by themselves to get to school. The school has about 180 girls and 160 boys and 30 faculty \u2014 that\u2019s who we\u2019re doing this project for. They have sanitation needs that need to be fixed, and it\u2019s cool we get to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Biomedical engineering major John Wilke works with Wright State\u2019s chapter of Engineers Without Borders to improve sanitation in a small village in Uganda. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":126970,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[722,4266,2025,743,715,2061],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-126954","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics","category-biomedical-industrial-and-human-factors-engineering","category-community-service","category-engineering-computer-science","category-news","category-undergraduate"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126954","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126954"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126954\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":126990,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126954\/revisions\/126990"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126970"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126954"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126954"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126954"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}