The next step for our organization is to upgrade a room for use in prototyping our designs. In the past, the club had to work off campus, which made the process very difficult. However, we have the opportunity to create a space catered to our specific needs, which will ultimately make our projects more reliable and have a better outcome!

The Mission

Our mission is to combine and develop the knowledge, skills, and experience of the RPI community to engineer solutions to social, environmental, and economic problems, both domestic and foreign, in the most sustainable way possible.

What You're Supporting

Prototyping is an integral element of any engineering project because it is the stage where our ideas become reality.

This stage helps us to minimize design errors and prevent major issues from arising down the road when we are closer to the completion of our project. It would be even more costly, both regarding time and labor, to realize that one of our measurements or calculations was wrong in the final stage. Prototypes also allow us to rigorously test different elements of our projects to ensure design optimization. 

ESW always works with the safety of the community in mind; we would never want to implement the actual project without ensuring we have considered all scenarios. Similarly, extensive testing also provides us with the opportunity to gain a better understanding of our design. We can use the feedback from these tests, figure out what works and what doesn’t, and accordingly adjust our design. 

Overall, ESW’s goal is to benefit our local and foreign communities in a sustainable and meaningful manner. We have already spent a couple of years planning and working on the Solar Bus Stop project and our Mexico project. To help fund our next stages and push the boundaries on what ESW as an organization can do, we request that you consider supporting us through a donation so that we can give our community the best experience possible.

This project will connect Rensselaer with other communities in the world, allowing RPI students to collaborate, work on their engineering skills, and gain valuable experiences while improving the quality of life for the greater community. For our foreign projects, villagers in a third-world country will receive a system allowing them to access hot water and more sustainable sources of electricity. 

For our local projects, RPI’s students will gain space to warm up during the harsh winters and charge their phones while waiting for the campus shuttles. As many know, one of the best ways to learn is by doing: members will have opportunities to make a real impact on lives outside their own and learn skills they can use in the future, such as soldering, innovation, leading, financing, and prototyping.

We need to raise $1,500 in order to develop a prototype room that will be used to comprehensively test our designs and projects before their full implementation.

Who We Are

RPI Engineers for a Sustainable World (ESW-RPI) was founded in 2005 and has been sending club members to Ek' Balam, Mexico since July 2011. During the first year, potential future projects were discussed with the villagers after three RPI students completed an initial assessment of the village. The following year, three members returned to Ek’ Balam and constructed an Eco House called La Casa de la Comunidad, which provides a housing location for volunteers in the village, and installed solar panels near community houses while preserving the cultural aspects of the village, as desired by the villagers. 

ESW-Mexico has since traveled to Mexico to fix problems with photovoltaic cells, implemented new technologies including the solar water heater, and repaired constructed systems. Due to the nature of our projects, prototyping is a vital part of ensuring that our designs are safe, and is ultimately the next major step for our organization. For more information, please visit the RPI Engineers for a Sustainable World website.