Tufts alums and current students spent constructive time at a Habitat for Humanity project this October in La Puebla, Mexico with the support of the Office of Alumni Relations and the University College.
The build was part of the annual Jimmy Carter Work Project (JCWP), a week of intense construction of low-income housing for families that takes place at different locations worldwide every year.
The project pairs a group of volunteers with a family in need of housing and has them to work together to construct a simple but serviceable home.
This year's build resulted in 75 new houses and drew 2,500 volunteers. The Tufts team completed two houses during their weeklong project.
Junior Mauricio Artinano, senior Zach Baker, and second-year Fletcher students Brooke Barton, Julia Sable and Marcela Prieto-Millan joined nine alumni on the trip, along with Pam Halton, a visiting lecturer in the Department of Romance Languages.
"It was a lot of fun because we get to build with the families," Artinano said, "And we all became really close to the family that's going to live in the house."
The annual JCWP project is sponsored by former President Jimmy Carter and his wife, and facilitates a "blitz build" -- a large construction project in a certain area.
Carter and his wife were working alongside volunteers on the build, Artinano said.
Previous JCWP builds have taken place in South Africa, South Korea, and the United States.
Following their seven days in La Puebla, the Tufts group visited to Oaxaca for three days, where they observed festivities for the Day of the Dead, interacted with locals as they decorated family graves in cemeteries and toured the ruins at Monte Alban.
The trip was one of many excursions worldwide that the Alumni Relations Office organizes for the alumni community. The build project was the first time, however, such a trip included current undergraduate and graduate students.
Such collaboration was unusual and appreciated, Artinano said. "The alumni were really happy, and they enjoyed having current students there and learning how Tufts is now."
Habitat for Humanity is a Christian nonprofit organization that constructs simple homes all over the world for families in need.
Habitat families pay for their homes with a down payment, a not-for-profit mortgage, and their own labor and assistance in the construction.
