Deborah Clarke joins Queen's Rotaract Club for outreach in Kitchenumaykoosib Inninuwug

Deborah Clarke completed her first year at Queen's in May and, within the month, she was off to the community of Kitchenumaykoosib Inninuwug (a/k/a "KI") with the Queen's Rotaract Club. Each year Queen's Rotaract coordinates a service trip, generally internationally, and this year they chose this community in Ontario's far north. Deborah recounts her experience, immediately upon her arrival, here.

Just back from the Kitchenumaykoosib Inninuwug (I can pronounce it now) trip, relaxing at a the hotel. Wow. What a trip. I think I accomplished what I set out to do and I learnt so much more along the way.

The Rotaract team that I traveled with was an excellent group of people. I was very sorry to have to leave them. We stayed in in a lovely house (comparatively) on one end of the island that looked out over Trout Lake. The only catch was a lack of running water and so my first shower in six days happened when I got to the hotel. It is a good thing that I didn't mind much and that it didn't show on me much.

When I was in grade 11, my family and I went to Tijuana, Mexico to work with an orphanage and, reflecting on that, I am certain that they had it better than most people living in KI. It was hard to see people living in those conditions and knowing that they're under the same government that we are. I definitely feel very impacted by the trip and hope I'll have more opportunities to go in the future.

In terms of working with the kids, the helicopter project when really far. I was able to build them with grade 5 and up, though not the grade six class, and even the high school kids enjoyed it. I brought about 50 of the propellers. It was a great way to kick off our time together, we had a lot of fun. I had a good talk with the high school students (all five who were there that day) and I really hope that I did create an impact. Regardless, you can be sure that I successfully conveyed my excitement about engineering :)

The Queen's Rotaract Club created a blog to document their experience and it includes a post called "Deborah Day," wherein our Deborah led engineering-oriented seminars. Here are some photos Deborah shared of her trip to KI.