Tag Archives: Safe Agua Chile

Breaking the Cycle of Poverty Through Clean Water

Fast Company has a great article about the Safe Agua Chile project, a collaboration between Designmatters and NGO Un Techo Para Mi Pais. The project, which we’ve highlighted in this blog, challenged 12 Art Center students and three faculty members to work directly with impoverished communities in Santiago, Chile, developing new tools and methods of storing, utilizing, transporting and conserving water.

Check out the great article at Fast Company, as well as the project’s official blog. Desigmnatters Director Mariana Amatullo also writes about the project in the latest post on the Designmatters blog. Great and inspiring work, everyone!

A Day in the Life: Safe Agua Chile

AshokaTech is following 12 Art Center students who travelled to Chile for the Safe Agua Chile collaboration with Un Techo Para Chile. Last week, we learned that storing water in multiple containers increases the possibility of water contamination, since containers are not always stored properly and often pick up dirt and germs. The conditions in the campamentos make it difficult to preserve water quality. Art Center students Erica and Elizabeth are working towards eliminating these contamination risks by designing easy and responsible solutions.

“Families in campamentos have tap water delivered but they store it for a long time in containers that are not kept clean. They do use chlorine for cleaning and purifying water, but the main problem is that they are not measuring safe chlorination. Thus, Erica and Elizabeth’s solution proposal is to enhance strong chlorine measuring education and to encourage the use of a low-cost water filter.”

Read more about Erica and Elizabeth’s study, and view their presentation, at AshokaTech.

A Day in the Life: Safe Agua Chile

AshokaTech is following 12 Art Center students who travelled to Chile for the Safe Agua Chile collaboration with Un Techo Para Chile. The latest installment has our students learning what it is like for the local people from campamentos, with no running, potable water.

“The students are starting to understand the issues affecting the lives of these families. They are now wondering: What if students could design a new system through which water is delivered? What if these families could actually have a running water system? What if there was a way to minimize the number of steps to their daily tasks? What if there was a way to bathe indoors? The students will have to work on these questions and find out how possible it is to make it a reality.”

Follow along with us at AshokaTech!

A Day in the Life: Safe Agua Chile

AshokaTech is following 12 Art Center students who travelled to Chile for the Safe Agua Chile collaboration with Un Techo Para Chile. This installment has the students arriving in Santiago, ready to spend 12 days living among the area’s poorest families in the slums.

“The excitement and incertitude are overwhelming. All they need to do now is focus on one question: How can they work with people living in Chile’s campamentos to develop new tools for using, storing and transporting water in order to help improve the quality of life?”

Follow along with us at AshokaTech!

The First Drop to a Life-Changing Story: Safe Agua Chile

The editors of the AshokaTech blog, a great reference on innovation and social enterprise, are running a series of articles detailing a current Art Center studio collaboration with the NGO Un Techo Para Chile. For the studio, facilitated by the College’s social impact educational department Designmatters, students are challenged to develop ways to help slum-dwellers store, transport, use and conserve water. Their challenge is to create low cost solutions that can really be used in the real world.

Such an exciting project. Be sure to follow along with us at AshokaTech!