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Engineering DesignEngineeringDesignProgramwww.edp.psu.eduThe Engineering Design Program (EDP)is based on the concept of integratedengineering design: the integration of theideas, disciplines, people, and resourceswithin engineering and beyond that arenecessary to achieve optimal design solutionsfor products, systems, processes, andservices. Strengths of the EDP include designmethods, systems design, design for humanvariability, design cognition (decision making),global design with worldwide partners,innovative design, service engineering, andclient-based design project experiences. TheEDP offers courses for all levels, from anaward-winning first-year design course tograduate-level courses.Engineering design is an essential skill for allengineering disciplines. Design permeatesall aspects of an engineering project byencouraging preplanning, considerationof the parties that the design could affect,environmental impact of a design, and manyother facets. Used properly, engineeringdesign can make an end product that providesa creative, economically engineered solution.Humanitarian Engineering:Students design and build eco-villagefor children in KenyaThere are more than 300,000 “street children” in Kenya, Africa—those whoare either orphaned or those whose parents don’t have the means to carefor them. Some of these children are fortunate enough to find their way tothe Children and Youth Empowerment Centre (CYEC), an orphanage locatednear Nyeri, Kenya, which provides a safe haven, food, and shelter for them.Unfortunately, 95 percent of these young people end up back on the streets—nearly always without possessing any marketable skills that would give thema chance at a better life.instead of going back onto thestreets with little hope of that betterlife, there could be another option:one where the children could live ina sustainable environment—an ecovillage—andlearn essential skillssuch as growing their own foodand mastering technologies thatwould assist them in starting theirown businesses. Upon exiting theorphanage, the children wouldnot only be able to use these skillsto sustain the eco-village,but they would givethem a competitiveadvantage in themarketplace in orderto gain employment.Photos:Miranda HitchcckStudents in one section of EDSGN452 Projects in CommunityService Engineering under thedirection of Assistant Professor ofEngineering Design Thomas Colledge,are working to build such a place—aneco-village that provides shelter,education, and skill training for thestreet-dwelling children of Kenya.In spring 2009, 31 students in the classdesigned nine separate, appropriatetechnologies and then integratedthese technologies into a larger systemconstituting the eco-village. These subsystemsincluded enhanced agriculturalproduction, biodiesel production,alternative energy, appropriate housing,wastewater treatment, water sourcingand treatment, a merry-go-round pumpsystem, master planning of the villageitself, and educational components foreach of the subsystems. Together, thesesubsystems worked with and off ofone another to create an infrastructuresystem while providing learning anddevelopment opportunities for theCYEC residents. These types of projectsfall under a broader array of effortstitled “Essential Design.” EssentialDesign is one of the thrusts of theHumanitarian Engineering and SocialEntrepreneurship initiative (see www.engr.psu.edu/hese).While designing the eco-village,cultural issues were also taken intoconsideration. The students in thecourse were required to take a onecredit,concurrent seminar with theMashavu and WishVast project teams(see page 30 for story) to ground themin the basics of humanitarian design,user-centered design for extremeaffordability, social entrepreneurship,systems thinking, travel and fieldwork,and related issues for technologybasedsocial ventures in developingcommunities.During the summer of 2009, 15 of thestudents from the spring offering ofthe course traveled to Kenya for threeweeks to implement their projectsand test the viability of the designs aswell as the cultural acceptance of thetechnologies. The teams constructedtheir various subsystems at the CYEC.The Penn State teams worked inpartnership with the CYEC and theJomo Kenyatta University of Agricultureand Technology.Many of the teams found success in theimplementation of their projects. Theagriculture team constructed a hightunnelgreenhouse with a drip-irrigationsystem for growing vegetables, whichhas proven to be especially useful inthe off-season. The water pump teamsuccessfully installed a pumping system.The pump, which has a merry-go-roundon top and is connected to a treadlepump underneath, allows childrento play on the merry-go-round whilepumping water for agriculture, drinkingwater, showers, and cooking.Other successful projects included thewater project, which culminated inthe construction of a water catchmentsystem and associated filtration device;the alternative energy project, whichresulted in a bicycle that generateselectricity to charge cell phones andother small devices; and the biodieselproduction system, which utilizes canolaseed as a feedstock to produce biodieselas a fuel.Some projects proved to be a bit tooambitious given the time and resourceconstraints but were modified toaccommodate the need. For example,the housing team had anticipatedconstructing a house from rammedearth in the three-week period; insteadthey built a rammed earth structureused as a latrine.“It was OK to fail,” said MeghanHoover, a senior from the College ofAgricultural Sciences and a Community,Environment, and Development major.“The housing team got there and therewasn’t the time and manpower tocomplete the project, but they still cameout with something really productive atthe end.”“We can come up with really greatdesigns here, but the question waswhether we were going to be able toimplement them in Kenya,” addedmechanical engineering graduatestudent Tara Sulewski. “Some projectswere good, and some projects weren’tas successful, but it was a great learningexperience and [opportunity] to workinternationally, actually implementingour design solutions to make the lives ofothers better.”Over the next year, the students,instructors, and partners plan to scaleup the efforts and continue this ongoingproject, finding more grant money andmodifying the classes to accommodatenew technologies. Hoover and Sulewskigave an estimate of about five to sevenyears before the village would reach itsfull potential. Once it is established,it may be used as a model that can bereplicated throughout Africa.For more information about the ecovillageproject, visit the HumanitarianEngineering and Social Entrepreneurshipwebsite online at www.engr.psu.edu/hese and the Children and YouthEmpowerment Centre online at www.cyec.net.4 | SEDTAPP NEwS | SPriNg 2010 SPriNg 2010 | SEDTAPP NEwS | 5