These 12 students and faculty are proof that the Wisconsin Idea is a living, serving idea.
This year’s Wisconsin Without Borders awards honor these students and faculty for their community-engaged work at home and across the world. The 2019 awards honor work that demonstrates excellence in collaboration between the university and local and global communities. Each award carries a prize of up to $1,000.
Wisconsin Without Borders (WWB) is a UW-Madison alliance and award program that recognizes globally-engaged interdisciplinary scholarship and fosters excellence by networking through joint learning activities. WWB draws on the history and values of the Wisconsin Idea and the many remarkable partnerships that UW-Madison faculty members and students have initiated, both in Wisconsin and around the world.
WWB is a partnership between the Morgridge Center for Public Service, the Global Health Institute and the International Division.
Peter Bosscher Undergraduate Award
Marisa Dunning, Beth Enright, Josh Newman, Keerthana Sreenivasan, Marisa Gonzalez, Ethan Heroux, Jordan Daniel, Isabel Reams and Ashley Himmelmann
Engineers Without Borders UW-Madison Lweza Project
Community Partner: Village Health Project
The Lweza Water Project works to provide a sustainable clean water source for the community of Lweza. This team works towards the goal of providing access to clean water in addition to developing globally conscious engineers on the UW-Madison campus and giving them the opportunity to gain experience outside the classroom. Through the installment of a clean water source, the team hopes to improve the overall quality of life in the community. As a unique element, this project is fully owned by the community and they are the primary parties in charge of decision making and maintenance of the system, to ensure long-term sustainability.
Community-Based Research Award
Gail Prasad
Investigating Languages and Literacies in Multilingual Schools
Community Partner: Thoreau Elementary School (MMSD)
This project is designed as a strategy to build social understanding and appreciation for cultural and linguistic diversity across the curriculum. Thoreau Elementary School serves a diverse student body with 31 percent of the students as English Language Learners, speaking 22 different home languages. This project aims to raise the awareness of both teachers and students of the value of linguistic diversity in their school. At the conclusion of the first year, the school/project held a showcase, exhibiting students’ bound and published multilingual works.
Service-Learning Award
Lorena Perez-Hernandez
Mission H.E.L.P Belize
Community Partner: Peacework International
For the last eight years, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Physician Assistant (PA) program has traveled to rural and impoverished areas of Belize to provide medical care at temporary clinics. In collaboration with Peacework International, who does considerable community organization in Belize, local providers and the Belize Family Life Association (BFLA) this group has worked to provide cervical cancer screenings and sustainable medical care to several small villages.
4-W Award: International Studies
Lusayo Mwakatika
ACADES Agribusiness Project
Community Partner: ACADES
The goals of this project are trifold: first the project aims to facilitate youth’s access to sustainable and profitable markets for agricultural produce in Malawi, second the project aims to facilitate youth access to production resources and third, to facilitate youth access to skills, knowledge and information about agriculture and business in general as access to this information is hard to come by in many areas of Malawi. To date, this project has reached about 3100 youths, most of whom are women.