Students Volunteer in U.S. and Abroad
Approximately 15 undergraduates in the architectural engineering program have made a commitment to spend their spring break serving others through a Habitat for Humanity project in Concord, Calif.  The project is being arranged by the student chapter of the Architectural Engineering Institute (Bob Davis, CEAE faculty advisor), which selected Concord from a list of local Habitat chapters requesting help that week.

Later this spring, five engineering students in the CU chapter of Engineers Without Borders will join CEAE Professor Bernard Amadei on a return trip to Rwanda to assist a village suffering from poverty, drought and unsafe drinking water.  The trip is the fourth by EWB to Rwanda since March 2004. During the visit, which  was recently postponed from March until May, the team plans to work with vocational students in the village of Muramba to install two rainwater catchment systems that will augment clean drinking water supplies for approximately 6,000 people.
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Field Laboratory for Appropriate and Sustainable Technologies
The College of Engineering and Applied Science is building a unique, new teaching and learning facility to give students the opportunity to practice sustainable building techniques in an outdoor setting.  The Field Laboratory for Appropriate and Sustainable Technologies (FLAST), which occupies 400 square feet directly east of the ARC on Marine Street, will allow students to conduct hands-on experiments as part of their coursework or for research and development.

The laboratory is an integral part of Bernard Amadei’s CVEN course “Sustainability and the Built Environment,” which covers topics such as eco-materials, sustainable water and wastewater systems, renewable energy, waste and waste products, strawbale construction, and natural plasters. The goal of the facility is to be self-sufficient, generating its own power using solar voltaic panels and possibly biodiesel, and collecting and processing enough rainwater to complete all onsite projects.

The laboratory has been approved as a temporary facility for a one-year period. For more information, visit www.edc-cu.org/FLASTlab.htm
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TeachEngineering Digital Library Goes Live
The TeachEngineering digital library collection, which is part of the National Science Digital Library initiative of the National Science Foundation, was launched in January. Located at http://TeachEngineering.com, the digital library is a searchable collection of standards-based K-12 engineering curricula that use engineering as a vehicle for the integration of math and science.

ITL co-director Jackie Sullivan led the multi-institution development of the TeachEngineering collection.  The collection is targeted at K-16 educators, and the ITLL welcomes working with faculty from throughout the college that are looking for a way to have a national impact in K-12 engineering through creation and online publication of age-appropriate, standards-based engineering curricula that integrate science and math for K-12 youth.
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