Promoting Sustainability in Guatemala: Building Solar Ovens

why it's important:

The mission of the Spanish Language House Program is to provide student residents the opportunity
to “live the languages” on a daily basis at Cornell University. Furthermore, students each year are
encouraged to take a cultural immersion research trip that entices them to explore, plan and
experiment with ideas that relate to their future trip and that will expedite their language skills. This
year, the Spanish House residents, in an effort to promote global responsibility by living the
language have chosen to take a trip to Guatemala to teach a group of Mayan people sustainability
practices that will be beneficial to their wellbeing and to the wellbeing of their environment.
Regular language practice makes students more comfortable in expressing themselves in
Spanish—taking a trip to a Spanish speaking country encourages students to understand other
cultures and to become global citizens. Part of being a global citizen is not just to learn and debate
about ideas such as sustainability and responsibility, but also to engage in activities that promote
these ideals. In this spirit the Spanish House proposes to take a trip to Guatemala where we will
work with community leaders to educate individuals on how to live sustainably by forming a
synergy between environmental stewardship, economic growth, and social progress. The main goal
of this trip is to have conversations with Mayan students and leaders in a village in Guatemala, and
to introduce them to sustainable methods that they can use to improve their standard of living.
Through these interactions, we hope to find out whether it is possible to introduce the concept of
sustainability to a culture whose priority is to survive and develop, and not necessarily to be good
stewards of the environment.

the plan of action:

We are planning to venture to Guatemala in order to interact with a Spanish speaking culture and to teach affordable sustainable
methods to indigenous people we have decided to focus our efforts in Lake Atitlan community of Guatemala.
The projection for this project is to use it as a tool to educate Mayan people on the importance of forming a
synergy with the environment.
Our project attempts to reduce the smoke concern and all the negative effects arousing
from cooking with wood fires. It is the solar oven; a simple funnel built out of scraps of plywood or
chipboard that are covered with a highly reflective material like aluminum, and that redirects the
sun’s rays into a box with a black pot inside of it. This pot absorbs the sun’s rays, raising the
temperature up to 300 degrees Fahrenheit. The main advantage of using the solar oven is that it
would significantly reduce the amount of logging occurring around this area, especially during the
dry season months, which last from October through May.
We intend to conduct research during our one week stay in Guatemala to answer the question, “Is sustainability viable in impoverished countries?”
By focusing a bit more on this research topic,
we would still be able to teach people the importance of sustainability and of taking care of their
natural surroundings.
In addition, there are several biology majors in our group who
can use this research trip to for the advancement of their careers. This investigation would get us
involved directly with a university in Guatemala, called Universidad del Valle (and with a group of
students) that is already doing a study on these solar ovens, giving us an opportunity to work with another
group of students whose first language is Spanish.

how you can get involved:

Others can do the following:1.)donate materials to create solar ovens in Guatemala and 2.)take similar trips to Guatemala to further encourage sustainable habits and pehaps even create more solar ovens abroad.

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