Community Partnerships - International
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Spotlight on a Past Project: Together By Design
When disaster strikes, Darlene Spracklin-Reid brings together a community to rebuild, all while giving students hands-on learning experience and inspiring the next generation of volunteers. Ms. Spracklin-Reid, is the co-founder and director of Together by Design (TBD), a not-for-profit that brings together engineering students and apprentices to work on community service projects. Ms. Spracklin-Reid co-founded the TBD project with John Oates, from the College of the North Atlantic. Their aim was to encourage volunteerism in Newfoundland and Labrador, as well as help the people New Orleans. Starting in 2009, she has led a team of volunteers to New Orleans to help rebuild after Hurricane Katrina. The team has also worked on projects in Newfoundland and Labrador, improving teaching and learning facilities as well as accessible housing.
John Oates said,"CNA students have not only received a practical education with the help of the Fry Family Foundation, they have also learned the value of philanthropy themselves, by participating in projects funded by the Foundation. They are concentrating on rebuilding around an Educational Corridor. Their philosophy is that if you rebuild schools, libraries, community centres, etc., the things that families and communities need to thrive, residents will return. We have worked with these groups since 2007 because their approach to redevelopment and the goals of the community are closely aligned with the values of CNA and the Fry Family Foundation." Geomatics students surveyed a number of areas that have been identified as green space and beautification areas in the neighbourhood. An abandoned convent that the neighbourhood intends to renovate and use as a residence for volunteers was also studied for further development. Oates said, "The carpentry students secured and completed minor repairs on a number of vacant houses in the area. This work is necessary to keep houses from being torn down by the city and allows the neighbourhood to now redevelop the properties as low-income, affordable housing for the residents."
Ms. Spracklin-Reid said, "I'm an engineer and a volunteer. I also have a professional background in construction management. I thought it was important to install in students an awareness of how they can use their skills to give back to their communities. I feel it helps them further develop their skills and make them better professionals. I also feel it is incumbent on engineers to be leaders in community service. After all, our mandate is to make the world a better place. Having come from a construction background, I know that respect for the trades and the skills of tradespeople is essential. As a result, TBD was founded to bring students studying the trades and engineering together in community service. I became interested in New Orleans in particular from watching the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina on television. As each day passed, I couldn't believe how the situation for the people of New Orleans was worsened instead of improving. I was deeply impacted because it was truly an engineering failure. The city survived the hurricane, but it was the failure of the under-designed levees that caused so much death and destruction. As a professional engineer, I felt I owed something to the city, although I'd never been there. I felt drawn to use my engineering skills to try to help ameliorate the damage."
In 2016, volunteers spent more than 2 weeks working on housing projects. This trip included a mix of carpentry and engineering students, working on one housing project in the city's Lower Ninth Ward - one of the neighbourhoods hardest hit by the hurricane - and another on New Orleans east side. Ms. Spracklin-Reid said the trip not only helps the people of New Orleans, it lets the student volunteers take their academic study out of the classroom. "We find that it deepens their learning, and it provides extra motivation for really producing your best quality work."
John Oates said,"CNA students have not only received a practical education with the help of the Fry Family Foundation, they have also learned the value of philanthropy themselves, by participating in projects funded by the Foundation. They are concentrating on rebuilding around an Educational Corridor. Their philosophy is that if you rebuild schools, libraries, community centres, etc., the things that families and communities need to thrive, residents will return. We have worked with these groups since 2007 because their approach to redevelopment and the goals of the community are closely aligned with the values of CNA and the Fry Family Foundation." Geomatics students surveyed a number of areas that have been identified as green space and beautification areas in the neighbourhood. An abandoned convent that the neighbourhood intends to renovate and use as a residence for volunteers was also studied for further development. Oates said, "The carpentry students secured and completed minor repairs on a number of vacant houses in the area. This work is necessary to keep houses from being torn down by the city and allows the neighbourhood to now redevelop the properties as low-income, affordable housing for the residents."
Ms. Spracklin-Reid said, "I'm an engineer and a volunteer. I also have a professional background in construction management. I thought it was important to install in students an awareness of how they can use their skills to give back to their communities. I feel it helps them further develop their skills and make them better professionals. I also feel it is incumbent on engineers to be leaders in community service. After all, our mandate is to make the world a better place. Having come from a construction background, I know that respect for the trades and the skills of tradespeople is essential. As a result, TBD was founded to bring students studying the trades and engineering together in community service. I became interested in New Orleans in particular from watching the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina on television. As each day passed, I couldn't believe how the situation for the people of New Orleans was worsened instead of improving. I was deeply impacted because it was truly an engineering failure. The city survived the hurricane, but it was the failure of the under-designed levees that caused so much death and destruction. As a professional engineer, I felt I owed something to the city, although I'd never been there. I felt drawn to use my engineering skills to try to help ameliorate the damage."
In 2016, volunteers spent more than 2 weeks working on housing projects. This trip included a mix of carpentry and engineering students, working on one housing project in the city's Lower Ninth Ward - one of the neighbourhoods hardest hit by the hurricane - and another on New Orleans east side. Ms. Spracklin-Reid said the trip not only helps the people of New Orleans, it lets the student volunteers take their academic study out of the classroom. "We find that it deepens their learning, and it provides extra motivation for really producing your best quality work."