UCCS Engineering students traveled to Uganda during the summer of 2024 to create innovative appliances for people living on Lake Bunyonyi, utilizing their knowledge beyond the classroom.
The Global Livingston Institute sent seven UCCS students to Uganda last summer as part of their senior capstone in the engineering program. Alex Boerger and Malin Marius made the two-week trip including two and a half days of travel, five days at the project site and taking educational tours of neighboring countries.
Alexa Boerger
Boerger, now a graduate student, was completing her undergraduate in mechanical engineering when she went to Uganda. While there, she helped build a water pump that allowed access to water up the hill from the lake instead of traveling down each day to gather it.
“It’s not just ‘Oh, I’m going on a trip to Uganda’… we’re working with people. We’re trying to come up with a solution together,” Boerger said.
Boerger’s biggest challenge when building the pump was finding resources. “We had a prototype in America, but we had no idea what materials would actually be available,” Boerger said.
Boeger said it was hard to locate a piece that feeds water through the tube network of the pump. It took them a day and a half to find the materials to make it. The team spent four days total gathering materials for the pump, leaving them only one day to build it.
As a result, Boerger said her time in Uganda not only made her more confident in herself but in her skills as an engineer. She said that her it helped her find passion in her work, gain communication skills and hands-on experience, qualities she feels employers look for.
Boerger had the opportunity to return to Uganda later in the summer with another group of students as part of her master’s program. She said going back was like returning to old friends.
Malin Marius
Like Boerger, getting creative with resources was also a challenge for Marius. Marius’ group had the task of stabilizing dug-out canoes used by the locals. She said that these canoes, made from hollowed trees, are becoming skinnier and less stable with time due to the ongoing scarcity of large trees in the area.
The solution they found was using two airtight cans on either side, attached with a rubber rope and some wooden clasps. The design achieved their goals of being nonobstructive, cost-effective and functional.
Marius recalled the unsureness she felt about the project before leaving on the trip: “We’re going to have this project, and we’re going to have seven days to do it, and we’re either going to do it, or we aren’t … and I’m going to be really bummed if we don’t,” she said.
Marius thought the trip offered valuable work experience. “You can give five people the same equation on a piece of paper, and they can all solve it and that’s great. But you can’t take five people and put them in a situation where they have to, on the spot, be problem-solving and working cross-culturally [in a classroom],” Marius said.
Boerger said that any students interested in projects like the ones she and Marius worked on should reach out to her at [email protected].
The water pump. Photo courtesy of Alexa Boerger.