By Bob Deasy, Project Haiti Advisor, Farmington High School

Members of the FHS French National Honor Society and the Project Haiti Club form a backdrop for the receipt of a $3,000 grant from the CT Association of Schools (CAS). Dr. Karissa Niehoff, CAS Executive Director, is pictured awarding the grant to principal Dr. Bill Silva and Bob Deasy, grant writer and friend of FHS.

The grant money will be used to research the SODIS (solar disinfection) method of disinfecting unclean water and to design, fabricate and test modules that will hold specific plastic bottles for the purpose of using the sun’s solar rays to purify contaminated water. The target audience for the funded project is the infant and child population of Haiti.

Such a simple thing, a glass of water. We turn the faucet on; water comes out. We drink the water without wondering if it is safe to drink. This is not the case in Haiti where contaminated water contributes greatly to an extremely high mortality rate for infants and children due to diseases caused by contamination.

A CAS/CIAC Flanagan Grant was awarded to Farmington High School (FHS) at the end of the 2013-14 school year. The grant will be used to research the SODIS (solar ultraviolet water disinfection) method of disinfecting contaminated water. This is accomplished by the sun’s solar rays heating contaminated water in a special plastic bottle. Again, such a simple thing; dirty water in a plastic bottle left in the sun for six hours equates to safe drinking water. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), this method is being used successfully in various parts of Africa.

Farmington High School’s (FHS) new club, Project Haiti, was organized by a core group of seven seniors who are researching the SODIS method, asking questions, continuing research, and challenging the entire school body to join them to design, test and fabricate a system that will work in Haiti.

FHS is partnering with “Love in Motion,” a faith-based organization from New Hampshire, along with CAS’s “Mike Savage” schools in Haiti, to use their orphanages and schools to test our equipment.

FHS is also partnering with water and engineering companies for speakers/tutors to assist in our research and testing. As soon as we have tested prototypes, we will be going to Haiti to install these units and continue to gather data to improve on our methods to allow the children in Haiti to have such a simple thing, a safe drink of water.

If you are interested in joining us – possibly in fund raising, research or marketing – please contact Bob Deasy (deasyrfpsctorg), grant administrator and Project Haiti advisor.

Let’s keep it simple!

Bob Deasy is a former CAS/CIAC Unified Sports Assistant Director.