Paper ID #33788

Engagement in Practice: Pedestrian Bridges as Engineering

Service-learning Projects
Jay H. Arehart, University of Colorado Boulder
Jay Arehart is an Instructor in the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Architectural Engineering
at the University of Colorado Boulder and has volunteered as the Education Manager for the Engineers
in Action Bridge Program since 2017. Jay’s teaching focuses on project-based courses for architectural
engineering students including architectural studios and capstone projects.
Kathryn Langenfeld, University of Michigan
Mr. Brenton Kreiger

c American Society for Engineering Education, 2021

Engagement in Practice: Pedestrian Bridges as
Engineering Service-Learning Projects
Background and Motivation

Nearly one billion people live in communities that do not have consistent, year-round access to
all-weather roads, which provide access to schools, employment, or health care [1]. The existing
road networks in communities are fragmented due to rivers, which swell and become impassable
for weeks to months. This rural isolation, or lack of consistent access to essential services, is a
root cause of poverty worldwide, which can be alleviated through simple pedestrian bridges. In
Nicaragua, it was measured that with a footbridge, income from wages increased 18% and
consumption-equivalent welfare increased 11% [2]. Similarly, in Rwanda, a 25% increase in
labor market income was attributable to the construction of a footbridge [3]. The benefit of
footbridges as a poverty alleviation strategy in rural communities is clear, with the case
becoming stronger as more long-term monitoring and evaluation studies are completed.

Service-learning has the potential to significantly benefit students, institutions, and the
communities in which the project is implemented [4]–[7]. As a result, service-learning projects
have been incorporated across engineering curriculums as parts of both formal coursework and
as extracurriculars. However, a common critique of civil-engineering-focused service-learning
projects is that they benefit the students more than the communities or do not always provide the
expected long-term benefits to communities. For example, in water, sanitation, and hygiene
(WASH) projects, the extensive monitoring, evaluation, and maintenance required for effective
WASH interventions decrease the likelihood student-led projects will be successful in positively
impacting a community’s health over the intended design life [8], [9]. Furthermore, the
constraints of the academic calendar and the high turnover rate of students from year-to-year
often results in students only being engaged for a single year, while many infrastructure projects
take multiple years to complete from planning to construction to monitoring and evaluation.

As a result, it is often a challenge to identify service-learning projects that provide long-term

benefits to communities and significant learning experiences for students in a short time.
Pedestrian bridge projects address both of these challenges due to their measured benefits for the
community, relatively short construction schedules (2-4 months), and minimal in-use
maintenance. Historically, students across a wide range of universities have engaged in
pedestrian bridge projects alongside non-profit organizations such as Engineers without Borders,
Bridges to Prosperity, and Engineers in Action. These non-profit organizations are the liaison
between student teams and underserved communities, identifying the communities in need of
pedestrian bridges and coordinating with local governments, skilled workers, and community
leaders to prepare for the implementation of the project.

This Engagement in Practice paper aims to describe how pedestrian bridge projects can be
excellent candidates for service-learning projects through a case study bridge project completed
by students at the University of Colorado Boulder during the 2018-2019 academic year in the
country of Eswatini. We will discuss the footbridge technology, development of partnerships,
on-campus design phase, the implementation, and conclude with lessons learned and a future
outlook.
Footbridge Technology

The footbridge technology utilizes rudimentary construction techniques and is standardized to

allow for rapid customization to each site. The design follows advances made by the non-profit
organizations Helvetas and Bridges to Prosperity, each of whom has refined the design and
construction process for implementation in a variety of rural, resource-constrained environments.
Figure 1 shows a completed footbridge, which consists of a timber deck supported by steel
cables which are then supported and anchored by a stone masonry abutment with a reinforced
concrete anchor. Typical construction times for this type of footbridges range between two and
four months, depending upon the quantity of locally available materials, the size of each
abutment, the span of the bridge, and the availability of local unskilled labor.

Figure 1. The Mathangeni footbridge during its inauguration in 2019.

Partnership Development

Within the small kingdom of Eswatini, Engineers in Action (EIA) estimates that over 100
footbridges are needed to connect rural communities to essential services. The Mathangeni
footbridge connected over 600 families, including 416 students who were enrolled at the local
primary school (1km away from the river). During the rainy months (October through March),
the river is uncrossable for between 4 and 7 days at a time, leading primary and secondary
students to either miss significant amounts of school, or risk injury or death crossing the river.
Due to the large number of rural communities in Eswatini and their lack of access to essential
services, EIA established a bridge construction program with the support of the national
government in 2017.

Students from the University of Colorado Boulder partnered with EIA who provided on-site
logistical support for the Mathangeni footbridge. EIA worked closely with the local government
(Eswatini Microprojects), which organized much of the in-country logistics and funding for the
project. For example, agreements between the local community for funding, expected
contributions, and bridge site identification were handled by EIA. EIA’s coordination with the
local government and community allows all for the vast majority of a project’s logistics to be
developed before students’ involvement in a project. The four primary stakeholders of the project
were: (1) the community that benefited from the bridge, (2) the local government who provided
some of the funding for the materials, (3) Engineers in Action as a liaison, and (4) the students at
CU Boulder with a professional engineer mentor. To aid in the construction process and ensure a
high-quality project, EIA hires a local skilled mason to work alongside the student team and
volunteers and has a program manager for the country who assists with logistics and technical
challenges.

EIA provides a set of learning outcomes as a measurable framework of learning for students and
partnering universities. These outcomes address common, broad engineering education
objectives (e.g., ABET learning outcomes, ASCE civil engineering body of knowledge), in
addition to global engineering outcomes such as cross-cultural communication and systems
thinking [10]. The following list is adapted from EIA [11].

1. Apply engineering judgment and design principles within the scope of governing
building codes and regulations to design an engineering system (i.e., footbridge).
2. Pursue an engineering project from conceptual design to physical completion,
implementing comprehensive project management skills in a team setting.
3. Collaborate effectively with external stakeholders (i.e., partnering NGOs, local
municipalities, partnering communities, alumni, other EIA university programs, or sister
academic institutions abroad).
4. Integrate traditional knowledge and stakeholder perspectives to create engineering
designs that are sustainable, community-driven, and that ultimately empower long-term
development.
5. Understand the importance and evaluate the technical and ethical implications of civil
engineering infrastructure in transforming a community’s quality of life.
6. Apply a ‘systems thinking’ approach to solve problems and make connections across
multiple disciplines in an engineering project.
7. Evaluate the role global engineering plays in the world and how students can affect
change based on their educational experiences.
8. Understand the differences between a footbridge project and formal engineering
education, and why these differences exist.
9. Create viable solutions to real-world problems, despite not having one ‘correct answer’.
10. Understand that continuity in education is necessary to adapt and overcome ever-
changing adversity.
11. As a student, analyze your own transformation by reflecting on the diversity of
knowledge and perspective you experienced throughout the project.

Project Design

Students at the University of Colorado Boulder, in the form of an extracurricular student group,
prepared for the implementation of the Mathangeni project in two primary ways: (1) learning
about the footbridge design and implementation process, and (2) applying this knowledge to
design and plan for the construction of the bridge and communicating their understanding
through construction documents and written reports. The overall project timeline is described in
Figure 2.

May
Sep

Nov

Dec

Mar
Feb
Jan

Jun
Apr
Oct

Jul
Construction Implem-
Student Learning Design of Bridge
Preparations entation
(12 weeks) (12 weeks)
(10 weeks) (8 weeks)

On-Campus In-Country
Figure 2. Project timeline for on-campus design and in-country implementation.

The student team consisted of 8 students, ranging from first-year to fourth-year, from various
engineering majors (e.g., civil, environmental, architectural, mechanical and aerospace
engineering) with the majority within the civil engineering department. These students were
recruited by other students, who self-formed and managed their extracurricular student group.
For many students, this project was the first time they would be applying the engineering
fundamentals they learned in their coursework to the specific context of the design and
construction of a footbridge. Furthermore, the diverse educational backgrounds of the students
meant that not all had the same level of knowledge and expertise. To address this and avoid it
negatively impacting the success of the project, a knowledge transfer process between upper-
class students, who had prior design and construction experience, was implemented. This
knowledge transfer was accompanied by design and construction guides provided by Engineers
in Action.

During this student learning period (start of Fall semester through Fall break), EIA prepared the
in-country logistics, most importantly, identifying a technically and socially feasible site.
Towards the end of the Fall semester, EIA provided the finalized site information for the
Mathangeni bridge to the students, who then applied their knowledge from both coursework and
reviewing prior bridge designs within the context of an actual site. Industry-standard design
documents (construction drawings, specifications, and supporting calculations) and construction
documents (schedule, health & safety plan) were prepared and presented to a professional
engineering mentor and EIA staff through formal presentations in late February and April,
respectively. In addition to serving as a review of the student team’s design, the formal
presentations were also used as an opportunity for communication between stakeholders to
ensure that a high-quality project, which ultimately benefited the community long term, would
be achieved. These formal presentations were held in an educational manner, asking the students
to communicate their engineering solution and receive critical feedback, which they would need
to address and demonstrate mastery of their design and construction plans before given the notice
to proceed.

Project Implementation

After successful preparation, the student team traveled to Eswatini to implement their footbridge
design and construction plan. During the 8-week implementation trip, the students entered a
significantly different learning environment than the “classroom-style” environment present
during the on-campus portion of the project.

In Eswatini, the students had expectations of how the project would unfold based upon their
carefully created constructions plans, yet reality required students to adapt their plans. One of the
first problems to arise was the inability to keep pace with the originally planned construction
schedule due to unforeseen complications with labor availability and material deliveries. The
students had to reevaluate their construction schedule and critical path to accommodate these
delays, and plan for other potential complications. This situation provided a valuable learning
opportunity for which the students needed to reassess their solution. Without the experience of
implementing their own construction schedule, the students would not have recognized what
issues there might have been.

Additionally, a critical skill for engineering graduates working both domestically and abroad is
the ability to communicate with a variety of stakeholders. The students were required to navigate
communicating their engineering solution with community members and government officials,
each of whom had different expectations for the footbridge design and aesthetics. The cross-
cultural communication skills developed by the students throughout the project are learning
outcomes that are challenging to achieve inside the traditional classroom.

The students faced numerous technical problems that required them to develop unique solutions
in the resource-constrained environment of a rural community. For example, the foundation was
mistakenly constructed with different dimensions than what they specified in the drawings. This
mistake led some students to become quite concerned regarding the stability of the structure and
provided a learning opportunity to discuss the role of tolerances in construction. The students
performed additional calculations to evaluate what tolerances would be appropriate and learned
that their mistake in construction would not compromise the integrity of the structure. While
having learned about tolerances in their classroom engineering education, facing the problem
firsthand in the field led to a greater depth in understanding of their design’s robustness and
constructability.

While problem-solving independently, the student team also needed to communicate any design
changes or technical problems with their professional engineering mentor. This required the
students to identify the situation, propose alternatives solutions, and communicate the pros and
cons of their proposed alternatives with a professional engineer. This industry-parallel
mentorship model for learning proved effective in cementing the students’ comfort with
identifying, assessing, and communicating problems.
Lessons Learned

Throughout the Mathangeni project, there were numerous lessons learned in the context of both
the students’ educational experience and the benefit to the community. The following list
outlines a number of the lessons learned from the project.
● Because students are learning, they are prone to making more mistakes than professionals
in the same setting. As a result, the construction schedule needs to be extended to allow
the space for the students to learn from their mistakes and rectify them. Fewer bridges
can be built in a construction season due to the extended schedules. By engaging students
on their projects, EIA completes fewer bridges. Due to this, other organizations may be
unwilling to partner with students, as it will detract resources from their primary mission.
● When encountering a problem, the students struggled to define the problem and apply
critical thinking to identify the root causes and potential solutions. In contrast to typical
textbook problems, those encountered on-site were ill-structured, with solutions that
extended beyond just the technical realm. As a result, “just-in-time” instruction on the
construction site was required, and attention was paid to teaching critical thinking skills,
not just to addressing the problem at hand. For a smoother implementation trip in the
future, it is recommended that these critical thinking skills be developed on-campus
rather than just in-country. While these challenges slowed the rate of completion for the
project, they did not detract from the quality of the bridge, as technical expert was present
on site for all critical construction process to ensure the structure was constructed as
designed.
● Due to the 8-week construction schedule, it was a challenge to have an educator on-site at
all times. Thus, many teaching opportunities passed by the students. We recommend
having somebody with teaching and mentoring experience (e.g., graduate student, faculty
member, or professional mentor) on site during the construction to ensure that students
fully utilize all potential learning opportunities.

Future Outlook

Based upon the experience of working with the CU Boulder students on the Mathangeni
footbridge, the need for a more structured educational experience was realized. Since completing
the project in 2019, EIA has developed short online asynchronous courses that more formally
teach students the design and construction process, rather than relying on an upper-class student
to pass along the knowledge. These courses formally teach the technical skills required to
successfully complete a project. In addition to the online courses, EIA has developed a
curriculum that can be implemented by faculty and/or graduate students to build critical thinking
skills, which were found to be essential for a successful implementation trip. While the COVID-
19 pandemic did not affect the Mathangeni project discussed herein, the benefits of the online
education have not been evaluated, due to travel restrictions in both 2020 and 2021.

Furthermore, a rigorous evaluation and measurement of student learning is needed to understand

which aspects of a footbridge project are the most useful for students to achieve the learning
outcomes developed by EIA. This analysis will lead to the refinement of the project model to
better benefit the communities and students.
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