After an intense week, the Fellows have officially set up a new treatment center and prepared their village, Wambong, for its grand opening! The village, originally thought to have had a maximum of 35 households, turned out to have over 104! So they’ve definitely had their hands full.
The week started with testing the water from the Wambong dugout.
The beautiful and huge Wambong dugout.The Fellows' initial water test showed that Wambong's dugout water, though beautiful, was indeed dirty. James, thanks to all his recent training, was able to decipher the fact that Wambong's dugout water was indeed contaminated.James caught in a candid photoSarah and her new friend, her water test from the Wambong Dam.
* Next, the Fellows, met with the chief and elders of Wambong (55 village leaders were present in the meeting!) and explained that the village’s drinking water was dirty. They proposed working with Wambong and explained CWS’s approach. This meeting is the most important part of the process. It’s the initial contact with the community and establishes the relationship between the village and CWS moving forward. Ben did an excellent job leading the hour long meeting. Unfortunately, out of respect, we never allow photographs during these meetings.
The village leaders were excited to work with CWS and the Fellows set to work on building the new treatment center.
The spot for the new Wambong treatment center was selected and ground was brokenThe foundation for the center was laid.The villagers all pitched in to help build their center.It's unanimous. Wambong has the best treatment stand yet!The CWS Summer Fellows all left their mark on their masterpiece and returned the next day with the rest of the center. The Wambong Treatment Center!Ben and James teaching the children of Wambong the importance of clean drinking water and using the CWS safe storage containers as well as letting them know about the new treatment center The Fellows' little helpers during storage container distribution.Amaia, Molly, and Sarah spent two days teaching the women in charge of the Wambong center the process for treating the dugout water as well as how to manage the money from water sales.Sarah, Amaia, Molly, and Peter teaching the women how to treat the water.
With the treatment center built, the containers distributed, and the women trained, the Wambong treatment center was ready to open!
The CWS Fellowship Program kicked off without a hitch! Amaia Noguera, Ben Powell, James Little, Molly Barrett, and Sarah Britz, our first team of CWS Fellows, spent the week learning about the global water crisis, the water treatment process, the CWS Approach for bringing clean water to its communities, as well as getting to know Tamale and the various CWS villages.
DAY ONE:
The Fellows began their program in the “classroom”. For the first half of the day, after introductions and some review of the program itinerary, we settled in to review the history of the Global Water Crisis, the various approaches to water treatment, the background of Community Water Solutions, and the CWS approach for village implementations. For the second half of the day though, we let the fellows loose to explore Tamale through a little scavenger hunt! What was on the list? Various items that one can find in the open market and surrounding stands and stores, if one has a sharp eye that is. A price cap of 25 Ghanaian Cedis was given to make sure the Fellows had to negotiate appropriate prices and truly have a Ghanaian experience. They were dropped off in downtown Tamale with the 25 Cedis and enough money to take a taxi to find their way to the restaurant where we were all meeting for dinner.
The Fellows' booty from the Tamale Scavenger Hunt!
The Fellows returned successful! (Though they did have to settle for Nescafe rather than ground coffee.)
The following items were on the scavenger hunt list:
Anything with Pres. Obama’s picture on it
4 tomatoes
6 Chicken eggs (not guinea fowl)
One bag of groundnut paste
One bag of curry powder
Coke Lite
1 Meter of fabric with orange and blue
1 pound ground coffee
Any Tom Cruise movie
DAY TWO:
The next day, the team started off with a hands on lesson in the CWS water treatment process, starting with rolling alum balls and removing the turbidity in the same manner in which they would be teaching their village when we sent them into the field. We even had them use actual dam water from one of our villages. (Jerigu)
The Fellows learning how to roll Alum ballsPerfectly made Alum balls! Candid Shot with our Alum Balls. From left to right: Shak, Amaia, Sarah, James, Ben, Mike, and MollySample Dam Water collected from JeriguBen and James practicing using AlumParticle Removal: Using Alum to removal turbidity.James, Ben and Sarah. Fascinated by the magic of their Alum balls.Ben is impressed. Ta da! Within hours, the particles have settled and the water is clear.
Following the simulation of the treatment process, the Fellows saw their first villages. They visited 3 treatment center sites, Jerigu, Cheko, and Nyamaliga.
The Fellows go to see their first village dam. (Ben and Amaia shown)Shak and the Fellows at the Nyamaliga Dam.
DAY THREE:
Day three began with visits to other water-focused organizations working in the Tamale region.
Visit to Unicef Office in TamaleSamuel from Unicef discussing the organization's work concerning water health in Ghana with the FellowsFollowing Unicef, the group visits New Energy, a local development NGO in TamaleOsmond from New Energy discusses the many projects the organization has undertakenOsmond shows New Energy's design for an improved hand-pump wellAll of the New Energy campus is powered by these solar panels, another of the organization's specialties
The Fellows took the remainder of the day to explore Tamale a little more and rest up for the long day they had coming.
DAY FOUR:
Saturday, the Fellows embarked on the journey to Gidanturu to visit a treatment center in action. We began our day, and the long drive ahead of us, with the greatest treat Ghana offers, and the highlight of many of our days at CWS. A delicious egg sandwich, or as the Ghanaians call it, “eggs and bread”. Delicious.
Eggs and Bread!Great start to our day!
The Gidanturu treatment center was busier than ever! The Fellows watched the clean water flow as they got to know the children, the women, and the monkey of this lively village!
Baramini's son & little helper diligently writing down all the bucket numbers as his mother filled them
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Ben tries to take one of his new friends home with him in his bag...he was unsuccessfulMolly and Peter are amused...from a distance
After visiting the treatment center, the Fellows learned how to make household visits and take water samples.
The Fellows enter their first household to learn how to monitor and take water samplesAmaia and Ben return from succesfully visiting and monitoring 10 householdsJames, Sara and Molly return from successfully visiting 10 households
Later that day, the Fellows learned how to test the water samples they took in the CWS lab!
The 2010 CWS Summer Fellowship Program has officially begun! The 5 Fellows arrived in Accra yesterday and we are heading up to Tamale today! More pictures and updates to come soon….
The past couple weeks have been devoted to monitoring, updating my monitoring files (pretty much as fun as it sounds…), preparing for the rainy season, and getting ready for our awesome Fellows who arrive on June 7th! Its hard to take pictures of these tasks, but I managed to snap a few, enjoy! Be prepared for a post with our updated monitoring results soon!
Shak showing the results of our water quality testing to a woman in Gidanturu. We like to do this to show people what happens with the water samples we take from their safe storage containers. Its fun to see their reactions when they see the difference between a test with their "safe water" and the dugout water!Showing the water tests to some cute kiddos!New signboard at Gidanturu - thank you village sponsor, Colleen and Jeff Clopeck!
The next few pictures are from an old Guinea Worm Containment Center. In order to prepare for the rainy season, our team went to check out some rainwater harvesting projects (in two of our villages, the paths to the dugouts, and therefore the water treatment centers, flood during the heavy rains. We are thinking about setting up rainwater harvesting systems to fill the polytanks with rainwater during this time – ill keep you posted!). We stopped by this containment center to look at their rainwater harvesting system and found out that the center had essentially been abandoned. Why? Because there haven’t been ANY Guinea Worm cases in this area in months! Such great news!
Guinea Worm is a horrendous water-related disease that has been endemic in Ghana for years. Due to the amazing Guinea Worm Eradication Campaign, led by the Carter Center, the number of Guinea Worm cases has drastically reduced – especially over the past few years. Shak visited this center in 2008 and said that there were so many patients that they had to put beds on the veranda. Not anymore! As the Carter Center explains on their website:
“Humans are a Guinea worm’s only host, so spread of the disease can be controlled by identifying all cases and modifying human behavior to prevent it from recurring. Once all human cases are eliminated, the disease will be eradicated.”
I recently heard through the volunteer rumor mill that soon, it is going to be announced that Guinea Worm has been eradicated from Ghana!
Since humans are the only host for Guinea worm, these containment centers were built so that infected persons could be effectively treated and the disease could be kept from spreading
Empty Beds - wahoo!Picture on the wall of the Guinea Worm Containment Center advertising the LifeStraw - a point-of-use intervention designed to filter out the water fleas that cause Guinea Worm
CWS is excited to announce our first team of Summer Fellows! Congratulations to Molly Barrett, Sarah Britz, Amaia Noguera, Ben Powell, and James Little
This June, the Fellows will be traveling to Ghana were they will learn about the global water crisis and implement a CWS water business in a rural village. Interested in supporting their trip? Check out Molly, Ben, or Sarah‘s fundraising pages!!
Good News! The deadline for applications to the Community Water Solutions Summer Fellowship has just been extended to MONDAY, MARCH 15th at 5pm EST. While this is the FINAL deadline for the applications, you may receive a further extension for your letter of recommendation if needed. Please contact [email protected], if you need more time for your recommendation.
What IS the Community Water Solutions Fellowship?
The CWS Fellowship Program is a three-week water education and leadership training experience in Northern Region Ghana. The purpose of the fellowship is to teach individuals about the global water crisis, and inspire them to become leaders in the field of international development.
Fellows are grouped in teams of four and paired with a rural community in Northern Region Ghana. Each team works together to raise the $10,000/team ($2,500/person) fellowship fee before traveling to Africa. During this fundraising period, CWS will provide you with promotional materials, event ideas, a fundraising website and fundraising guidance to ensure that your team is able to raise the money needed for the trip.
On the ground, teams will spend the first week visiting CWS’s current sites where they will learn about the CWS water treatment methods and how to perform water quality tests. They then spend two weeks in the field implementing and monitoring a CWS water business in their partner village.
Although the application deadline has been extended, the final selection date has not changed. Applicants will be notified about the interview round on March 20th and the Fellows will be announced on April 1st.
Love reading this blog and wish that YOU could spend some time in Africa? You can!
Apply for the CWS Fellowship Program and volunteer with us this June! Applications are due on MONDAY (March 8th) at 5pm EST. For more info check out our website or email [email protected]!
So far, 2010 has been a great year for Community Water Solutions! Here are some of the things we are excited about:
The CWS Fellowship Program
CWS has just launched our new fellowship program, a three-week leadership training and water education experience in Northern Region Ghana. The purpose of the fellowship is to teach individuals about the global water crisis, and inspire them to become leaders in the field of international development.
The field of international development can often be a hard to break into. Post college, I was constantly looking for jobs abroad with non-profits and international aid organizations, and ran into many roadblocks. Most jobs in international development require years of “field experience,” but how can you get this experience if no one will hire you?! Its frustrating. Through the CWS Fellowship, we are hoping to provide individuals with some of the field experience necessary to start a career in international development, while also teaching them about the global water crisis.
We believe that this program is going to be the future of CWS. It will not only allow us to reach more villages more quickly through the help of our fellows, but also help us spread awareness about the water problem. We hope to inspire others to join us in providing clean water for the world, either by staying on with CWS, joining another organization working on water treatment, working in public policy, or starting their own non-profit or social enterprise!
CWS is now accepting applications for our Summer Fellowship (June 6th – 28th). If you are interested in applying for the CWS Fellowship Program, please our website and download an application!
Look like fun? This could be YOU!
The Medfield Fundriaser
On Saturday Feb. 6th, we are holding our first fundraising event of 2010 at the Kingsbury Club in Medfield, MA. As I mentioned in the previous blog, the event will feature a fun African drumming performance by the Rhythm Room Live! We will also be showing a movie with pictures and videos from our past year in Ghana, so that past donors can see how much they have helped to make a difference. The event is going to be a blast and I hope to see you all there! A big thanks to Alyse Shorland for putting together the movie for us, and to Jill Moran for volunteering her time and event-planning skills to help us put this together!
We’re Getting a TRUCK!
For the past year, one of our biggest fundraising goals was to raise enough money to buy a truck in Ghana. In the past, we used taxis to get out to our villages, which was extremely expensive and time consuming (the amount of time wasted just waiting for our taxi drivers to show up is ridiculous!) Thanks to all of the support we received over the holiday season (especially from the MIT-Sloan Auction and the Global Giving campaign) we are finally able to get our truck! This will save us enormous amounts of money in transportation (all of which can now go towards helping more villages get clean water!) and will allow us to reach villages in more rural, secluded areas! Peter is currently working on getting his drivers license so he will be ready to drive the truck when I come back in February. Be on the look-out for a post sometime next months with pictures of our new ride!
In a couple of months, CWS could be sporting a truck very similar to this bad boy!
Echoing Green
For the second year in a row, CWS is a semi-finalist for the Echoing Green Fellowship. We are so excited, and honored to have made it this far! With all of the work we’ve done since last year, including in the addition of the fellowship program we think we have a better shot than last year!
Heading Back to Ghana
My plane ticket has officially been reserved and I will be heading back to Ghana on February 15th! I will have a very busy winter and spring, implementing in at least five more villages (sponsored by the Clopecks, our Facebook causes group, Gerry and Judy O’Connell, iContact, and one anonymous donor), while also preparing for our fellows to arrive in June. While fundraising, like online fundraising as well as physical events, and administrative work is a necessary component of working for a non-profit, I, like many others in my position I’m sure, truly love working in the field. I can’t wait to get back to Ghana and start doing what I love!
