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The family I was staying with had no running water, which was an initial shock to me, but the more I learned about Honduras, the quicker I realized that that is a normal occurrence. The people of Atima had a horrific water systems infrastructure and saw AguaClara as the way to improve their lives. The response we received from the people of Atima really spoke to me about the appreciation the people who benefit from AguaClara have for the project.
These feelings were reinforced at the town meeting we attended in Alauca. The meeting opened with a discussion amongst the townspeople as to whether they actually needed an AguaClara plant or if the project was being forced on them by another party. Every single townsperson vehemently supported the AguaClara plant being built. I distinctly remember one man thanking god that we had come and worked with them on the plant. The overwhelming support was something that you do not see while working on the project at Cornell. It is easy to forget that AguaClara is not a hypothetical project and that it really changes the lives of thousands of people with every plant built. The strong feelings the beneficiaries showed toward the project really spoke to me and emphasis the core goal of the AguaClara project.

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January 10, 2011 - We arrived today in Atima around 5 PM. Traveling here was maybe the bumpiest road I've ever been on. We were immediately distributed into host families. I'm staying with the owner of Pulperia Jenny. His two kids are Jorge Luis (8 years old) and Jenny (5 years old). We had a brief meeting with the mayor and he outlined the town's water problem. Recently a construction project broke part of the distribution line, so many places in the town are not receiving water. My host family doesn't have any running water. Right now the water they use for cooking and drinking is sent through a point-of-use filter given to them by a brigade. It looks like a 5-gallon bucket with a cylindrical canister filtering the water. My host family really didn't know how or if it worked. To me, it looked like some sort of cylinder containing activated carbon but I couldn't tell for sure.
January 11, 2011 - I woke up this morning and took a shower with a bucket of cold, dirty water. I was shivering the whole time because it was a cool morning. We met up with the rest of the team at breakfast. Jorge Luis and Jenny were there and were making fun of me for "sleeping in" until 8 AM and calling me a sleepyhead. They're fun kids. I haven't heard them complain or be upset about anything the entire time we've been here. I think Jorge Luis is especially mature for his age. It's hard for me to think about them growing up without any running water in their house, or think about them getting sick because of dirty water. It makes me feel proud to be part of a group of people who's actually taking concrete steps to help people in these situations. I'm glad the town is in touch with AguaClara - the townspeople owe it to their kids to do something about the drinking water problem. 

<Robert Solaski>'s Reflection

AguaClara has served as a major catalyst in my life and given me the guidance needed to realize my full potential as an engineer.
Unprepared and immature I stumbled into the Environmental Engineering major at Cornell. The rigors of engineering were a rude awakening. Having glided through public school with all A's and almost no effort, I simply did not know how to work so many hours and study properly. Not knowing what else I would do and not wanting to simply take the easy way out, I struggled through the Cornell curriculum. My GPA was abysmal to say the least, and I constantly questioned why I remained on this career path.
Then I stumbled upon CEE 2550 and I was formally introduced to AguaClara. On the Outreach team I had a smooth introduction to the program. The nature of the work, which I would truly not understand until much later, was honorable and the class functioned not like a competition, as I had experienced in many of my previous engineering courses, but more like a business where everyone is working towards a common goal. After CEE 2550, I knew that I had to get more involved with the program.
I then took CEE 4540 and the technical applications sparked my interest in a way that no other class had yet done. We were not simply doing problem sets of textbook questions; we were analyzing and understanding the physical equations and processes that governed the construction of water treatment plants that had been built and were fully functional.
Then I was given the opportunity to participate in the yearly trip to Honduras. The trip to Honduras unveiled to me the social context under which the AguaClara program operates. We met local families whose towns were plagued by water borne diseases caused by poor water quality. Compared to most of the towns that we visited our toilet water is of much higher quality than their kitchen sink. I had heard many times before that these people did not have access to clean drinking water but simply hearing it is just not the same as what our group experienced. In contrast when we visited the AguaClara plants that had previously been built in Honduras, the towns were happy to pay for such high quality water at the price we could provide to them with the technology We had helped to develop. The trip to Honduras gave us a big picture perspective that Cornell academics fails to acknowledge. At Cornell it is easy to get wrapped up in the stress of grades, In AguaClara it is about so much more than that. In AguaClara almost everyone gets exceptional grades, not because it's an easy course but because the social context of the course gives students purpose and motivation to far exceed the effort and passion they would exert for a grade.
AguaClara showed me why I want to be an engineer and the impact that an engineering degree allows me to make. After I became involved with AguaClara my motivation across the board drastically increased, my GPA even jumped a full grade point. AguaClara technology is incredible and the program is ready to spread, although I am scheduled to graduate I plan on working with AguaClara this summer and hope to be a part of the program even after I am no longer at Cornell. It is amazing how far the program has come, how much potential it still has, and how many lives it will touch in the coming years.
Thank you for the opportunity to be a part of such an incredible program, cause, and community.