SENIOR PROFILE: Janelle Heslop

Janelle Heslop was one of very few young girls interested in water quality at the tender age of 12.

Her first job as a pre-teen at the Hudson River Museum, where she studied water flows and sanitation, opened her eyes to the world of environmentalism.

But today, as she receives her diploma—after four years working with Engineers Without Borders—Heslop has set her sights on a world that operates on principles of social justice and sustainable development.

During her senior year, Heslop has served as the technical lead for the water team on EWB’s Uganda project, which has received sizable grants from the Clinton Foundation’s Global Initiative and the Environmental Protection Agency.

The native New Yorker has been working with an EWP team to bring greater access to water to a school in rural Uganda, where a single unreliable spigot serves over 500 students, teachers, and workers.

Heslop traveled last summer to Uganda—a country where she said she feels “completely at home,” though friends describe her as a city girl through and through—to study multifunction energy and power generators at a local school.

She and her companions noticed that the girls at the school had to carry heavy buckets of water long distances to their dormitories or latrines, and the chefs didn’t get enough water to do any real cleaning.

Immediately, the group began discussing strategies to improve the school’s access to water, and over the course of the school year, they developed a plan to add six or seven spigots to the school’s existing water source.

Heslop took a lead role in the group’s grant-writing campaign and said the project now has more funding than it needs.

“We don’t think we’ll have time to spend all the money we’ve received,” she said. “That’s a pretty great problem to have.”

Heslop said EWP has driven her to pursue a career providing sustainable solutions for communities in need.

“I see engineering as a way to create solutions for people, not because they’re incapable, but because they just didn’t have a chance to,” she said.

Before moving on to graduate school, Heslop has taken a position with the environmental consulting firm GreenOrder and will work in the city, advising companies about how they can make their product lines more sustainable.

She said that she wants to continue to pursue social justice in engineering.

“It’s not all about the science,” she said. “It’s really about how these projects can impact communities.”