Building Humanity

Eternal Family Build

Eternal Family believes family is the key to helping abandoned and neglected children, and is the foundation of their success. Families are comprised of a married couple who dedicates their life to raising a “family”. They may or may not have children of their own, but they will begin to take on children over a 2 year period, up to 10-16 children in all, and they will raise them as a family unit. Priority at Eternal Family (EF) is given to children that have lost their parents to HIV/Aids, malaria or yellow fever. The village was founded in 2008. There are currently 10 families caring for 100 children. Once a family reaches its full capacity, that family will remain unchanged until all the children eventually move out of the home. When a young adult moves out, another child is not brought into the family unit to fill the void, so the unit stays constant and children are not constantly coming in and out. This is important in keeping the family unit strong, and also eventually allows parents to phase out of service after 20+ years of dedication, unless they decide to go on to continue to care for a second generation of children. Since purchasing a piece of land in 2019, Eternal Family has been building non strop. They have finished 10 family homes, a chicken farm and extensive farmland which provides fresh eggs, meat and vegetables for all the families, and just last year opened a school that will serve the EF families as well as the greater community with space for 680 students. Our team will be assisting with the construction of home #11. Each home is 3,700 sf and includes 7 bedrooms, kitchen, pantry, laundry room and basement. Our team may also be asked to participate in other efforts around the village which might include site work or any other immediate project needs. We ask that the team remain flexible as we are there to assist in any capacity the village needs us.

Community/Resiliency Center

During Hurricane Ida in 2021, the house being used as the community gathering space for the Grand Caillou/Dulac Band of Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw tribal peoples was completely destroyed. The Grand Caillou/Dulac Band tribal peoples have been living in their ancestral traditional village of Grand Caillou/Dulac along the Louisiana Gulf Coast for centuries. Their ancestors were primarily of the historical Biloxi, Chitimacha and Choctaw but also Atakapas and Acolapissa Tribes. Sustaining the village was done by trapping, fishing, hunting and farming. Their people still continue to live off the water and the land to the best of their ability today but their tribe is in a serious crisis. The traditions and cultural practices that were handed down by ancestors are far less sustaining due to drastic environmental changes brought on by oil and gas exploration, erosion, salt water intrusion and climate change. We lose an average of a football field of land every 100 minutes: every day is a fight to save their tribe from losing their homelands, their culture and their identity to avoid extinction. This project is in collaboration with Community Engineer Corps, Building Humanity, Engineers Without Borders, Purdue University EWB Chapter and Community and College Partners Program (C2P2). Together with the Grand Caillou/Dulac Band, we will be designing a community center to serve as a day-to-day cultural hub. The building will be able to operate and accommodate meetings with the tribe elders, holidays and community gatherings, and other activities. Additionally, with the recent closure of schools and other infrastructure in the Dulac area, the community center will also serve as an informal learning space for children. The community center will need to be hurricane resilient in the case of a major weather event, including a storm surge. The goal is for the center to withstand a CAT-4 hurricane. While many tribe members evacuate inland during hurricanes, often, elder members of the tribe or those without adequate transportation will need to shelter in the building during a storm although this is intended as a last resort for anyone unable to evacuate.