Construction is underway in preparation for Engineering and Humanity Week at SMU.

The Hunt Institute is putting on the event to raise awareness.

“We have more internally displaced people on the planet than we have ever had,” Stephanie Hunt said. “I think its important to share this knowledge with students they’re the next generations that going to go out there and deal with the issue.”

SMU sophomore civil engineering student Travis Miller is the student leader for the project.

“Their slogan is change the conversation to action,” Miller said. “So taking these ideas that are always looming in engineers’ minds and actually putting forth… alright how can we actually change what’s going on in the third world and put the knowledge we have in iPads and Blue-Ray and the stuff we are using in the first world and those innovative mindsets and put them to good use for people who need just the basics: water and shelter.”

The physical centerpiece for the week will be the Living Village where there is a showcase of temporary shelters designed to house people living in extreme poverty or displaced by war and natural disasters.

“There’s so many opportunities to help people,” Miller said. “There’s so much pain in the world, but there’s also a lot of ways to help and to give hope and love. The whole goal is to use the education we’ve been given to help other out and show them that life would be something more than what they have.”

One particular shelter is a new development being tested for the first time at SMU. It’s made out of 250 to 300 compressed blocks of recycled plastic bags. The structure is flexible enough to absorb shock during earthquake situations and is very cost-efficient. A ten-foot by ten-foot temporary house costs about 250 dollars.

Twenty-Five SMU students will live, cook their meals and sleep in these structures this week and will be blogging about their experience in living like those in third-world countries.

Taylor Henry is one of those students.

“I think what’s cool is not everyone is necessarily going to know what’s going on as they walk by, but the awareness of just coming up and realizing that this is what someone lives in their whole entire lives and seeing a tent that someone lives in, not just like ‘Hey I’m going camping, I’m going to bring my tent.’ But this is what someone lives 10 years in,” he said.