http://waterbanks.org/
http://challenge.bfi.org/2013Semi_Finalist_WaterbankSchools
2013 Semi-Finalist: Waterbank Schools
Description of Initiative
The Waterbank School is designed to harvest the maximum amount of rain with minimum materials and effort in a central courtyard with
underground cistern. Surrounding the central cistern are protected, well-ventilated classrooms, teaching gardens and a community
workshop, including parents and community, enabling the school to become a catalyst for transformation. In a semi-arid region the school delivers 350,000 liters of
water annually and initiates region wide rainwater harvesting, filtration and conservation agriculture. The school is located in a semi-arid region in the Central Highlands of Kenya. Three more Waterbank School Structures are under construction in the region this year. Rain falling on the roof drains with 95% efficiency into the cistern, and is drawn off and filtered by ceramic water filters when used, removing 99.9% of pathogens. Water is used for drinking, daily meal preparation, handwashing and vegetable irrigation. The roof of the cistern is all-school gathering place and environmental theater where essential knowledge about practices and technologies is shared across multi-ethnic and language divides. The school educates 360 children, and provides water for 680 children, all from multi-ethnic, pastoralist communities living on less than $1.40/day. It serves as a community education center for 4000 and as a demonstration school for a region of 400,000 people. In Kenya there is 7 times the amount of rain falling than is needed by the population. Rain is an astoundingly underused resource and one that asks that we change our unsustainable relationship to water to a balanced one. The Waterbank School is designed to transform our relationship to water. ‘Business as usual’ advocates extracting water from underground, from non-renewable aquifers AND building schools that deflect rather than catch and store rainwater easily. We reverse this, bringing the water to the schools center to show how this resource can empower whole communities and lead to systemic change. Everyone can have clean water.
http://vimeo.com/63869310 
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