Non-Traditional University Research Partners That Facilitate Service Learning and Graduate Research for Sustainable Development

Goal 7 of the Millennium Development Goals addresses the need for safe water, sanitation, and hygiene by aiming to halve the proportion of people without access to safe water and adequate sanitation from 1990 benchmarks by 2015. One key for successfully integrating university research with global development is to develop strategic partnerships with non-traditional academic partners that have a strong community presence. Here we use several case studies to demonstrate how these partnerships are integrated with graduate education and research to develop sustainable solutions for global problems. The Master's International Program in Civil & Environmental Engineering at the University of South Florida (USF) provides students with an opportunity to combine their graduate education with service in the U.S. Peace Corps as water/sanitation engineers and an overseas research component. Key features are a 6-credit research thesis and a 9-credit, three course sequence in: 1) global public health assessment, 2) applied anthropology, and 3) sustainable engineering technology. Students may also incorporate with their degree a new graduate certificate in Water, Health, and Sustainability. An interdisciplinary graduate course allows students to investigate concepts of sustainability and research methods using a case study focus that focuses on mercury in the Tampa Bay area and a contrasting field based experience in Guyana. Students identify and integrate research approaches across disciplines, implement population surveying methods, and apply simple systems modeling. An NSF research project situated in Bolivia allows undergraduate and doctoral graduate students to work with a non-government organization and rural community water committees to research issues of water supply, water scarcity, sanitation, and watershed management. The Kiran C. Patel Center for Global solutions at USF also supports activities in this like the facilitation of graduate exchange training exercises with UNESCO-IHE students.