Building on Their Knowledge

Ten thousand miles from The University of Texas at Austin - nearly halfway around the globe - stands a building that represents the importance of education and the opportunities it provides. The children's library in Kallathupatti, South India, offers its village's 3,000 residents more than a dedicated space for tutoring, lessons and other educational resources. It's a place for growing hope, for creating community, and for opening a door to a life beyond child labor and the harsh poverty so prevalent in the region.

The library was built in 2021 by UT students through a partnership between the nonprofit CASA India (Church's Auxiliary for Social Action) and Projects with Underserved Communities (PUC), a collaboration between UT's Cockrell School of Engineering and UT Social Work.

Since PUC's inception in 2009, nearly 300 Longhorns have served more than 18,000 people as they've learned about themselves and the world around them. With compassion and care, UT students have worked on four continents, using their skills on community projects such as installing solar panels at a clinic for malnourished children in Guatemala, expanding a school in Tanzania, and creating access to clean water in Papua New Guinea.

These humanitarian engineering projects exemplify the Longhorn spirit and the University's mission to increase its global impact.

"A university is tasked with generating knowledge and gathering different perspectives," says Tanya Voss, assistant dean for global engagement for UT Social Work. "Now more than ever, it's vitally important that we educate our students about different ways to find solutions to our common problems."