There is an alternative to bikini contests and beer chugging races for spring break.
A student led organization called Global Brigades will travel to a rural community of Honduras this Sunday to spend their spring break implementing several projects to provide major improvements to current water systems, health care, sanitation, farming practices and education.
SDSU students Jimmy Taitano-Camacho and Ally Barnes are humble leaders of their global brigade. Their mission is to recruit soldiers for good and make a major difference in how people live.
"We actually have a variety of students from different backgrounds. A lot of the engineer majors have contributed. We have health majors, business majors and everyone has kind of collaborated to make these projects that we are going to implement while down there," Taitano-Camacho said.
It’s stuff that changes and saves lives.
"We're doing a clean burning stove project, drip farm irrigation, clean water projects so we have a lot of different stuff," Barnes said.
Clean, safe drinking water is not available to over 1.2 billion people (28 percent of the world population) and more than twice that number lacks access to adequate sanitation.
Honduras is one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere with an extraordinarily unequal distribution of income. A staggering 53% of the population lives below the poverty line.
With that in mind, not even a challenging economy at home could stand in the way of their mission. The students have raised over $25,000 to be implemented towards their projects.
This year SDSU has the biggest brigade and has raised the most money.
Their goal is to empower the community with the tools to be self-sufficient. In return the students learn how to develop solutions with minimal resources while experiencing a different country, culture and environment.
