March 23, 2010
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Taking a shower, getting a drink of water from the faucet or washing your dishes with running water at your home. All three are common occurrences that many Americans take for granted.
Vanderbilt senior swimmer Jessica Cohen has seen first-hand that having easy access to clean water is not something to take for granted.
Two summers ago, Cohen traveled to Emori Joi, Kenya for a month with an organization called Free the Children, which focuses on improving the lives of children in impoverished areas across the country. While in Emori Joi, Cohen learned very quickly that the everyday things she may take for granted back home, such as running water, aren’t available to the people of Emori Joi.
“One of the reasons the kids stop going to school is because four times a day they have to carry these huge barrels of water from the river, which is a kilometer away,” Cohen said. “I did it once, and these 11 year olds do it four times a day. I thought I wasn’t going to be able to carry it once.”
It’s been a year and a half since her trip to Africa, but she hasn’t forgotten that experience.
“The river is the same river that the animals go in, that all their waste goes in and that they wash their clothes in,” the Charlotte, N.C., native said. “When there is no rainy season that comes, it is dry.”
The other way the village gets water is by capturing it when it rains. Buildings are equipped with large gutters that collect the water when it rains.
The daily struggle just to get water got Cohen and the group of volunteers thinking of ways to improve how the village receives its water.
“Right before we left, we got together and thought of something we could do to continue our work (in Emori Joi),” Cohen said. “We decided we were going to start this program called Well Worth It because originally our idea was to build a well in the community that we worked in.”
Members of the group went their separate ways when they returned from Kenya. Despite being spread across North America, the group has continued to work toward building a well. After taking care of many of the administrative tasks last year, Cohen and the others are focused on fundraising for the project.
“We found out through our research that it would be roughly $70,000 to build one (well), so our goal right now is to raise $70,000,” Cohen said. “We want to have half of that by May 26, 2010, which is the day we left for Kenya two summers ago. That is our immediate goal.”
If Cohen and the others are successful at raising the funds, they plan on returning to the village for the groundbreaking ceremony.
“I think that Jess embodies what being a student at Vanderbilt is all about,” Vanderbilt swimming Coach Jeremy Organ said. “She balances her athletic and academic responsibilities very well, and her ‘spare’ time is spent doing what she can do to make this a better world. People with that kind of passion and dedication are rare, and we are lucky to have her as a role model on the swim team.”
Building a well in Emori Joi is Cohen’s top priority, and if she is able to accomplish her goal, she hopes that the well will be the first of many that Well Worth It will build in Kenya.
“Our initiative is to raise enough money and awareness, and hopefully continue to grow because in Kenya, Free the Children has nine communities that they work in. Ideally, we would be able to get a well in each of those communities.”
Working in the community is nothing new to Cohen, who had wanted to lend a helping hand in Africa since she was in high school.
“My mom always said I really enjoyed helping other people,” Cohen said. “Ever since high school, I really wanted to go to Africa and was really interested in Africa. I wanted to go because I was planning on setting my life goals to work in the communities in Africa and I had never been, so I didn’t want to do all sorts of studies if it wasn’t something I wanted to do, so I went over there and had a great time.”
The leadership initiative Cohen has taken in the Well Worth It program is no different than what she has done as a student-athlete at Vanderbilt. After serving on the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee as a junior, Cohen was selected as the committee’s president this year.
Cohen’s leadership in the community and among student-athletes on campus is something Organ believes plays an important role in the growth of the program.
“I think it is very important for our development as a team to have someone like Jess,” Organ said. “Jess is paving the way for future teammates by showing that being involved in groups such as SAAC is an important responsibility as a student-athlete at Vanderbilt.”
Cohen will graduate in May with a degree in human and organizational development. Even though she will be leaving Vanderbilt, she has no plan on leaving her work in the community behind. Instead, she hopes to make a career out of lending her hand to others by landing a job that works with developing international communities.
“My ideal path would be to spend a year or two internationally in Africa and then come back and lead trips or work on community development from the U.S.,” Cohen said.
