Guatemala Field Update with Saint Joseph’s College of Maine

In Guatemala, the project led by Saint Joseph’s College in partnership with Maine Medical Center, and the Sawyer Foundation continues to move from distribution into deeper learning and evaluation. Beyond reaching 500 families with clean water access, the team focused heavily on training and capacity building through 42 education sessions, as well as healthcare delivery supporting 300+ patients in the region. The work is now entering a more research-driven phase, including a comparative study on parasite infection rates among individuals with and without Sawyer filters.

The team also emphasized sustainability and local ownership, working closely with Partners in Development to ensure training and systems could continue long after the teams departed. In parallel, the distribution process itself served as a hands-on learning opportunity, helping refine implementation methods for future large-scale deployments. Data collection through surveys and water sampling is also helping to better understand both user behavior and environmental conditions in the region. Together, these efforts are strengthening not just access to clean water, but the long-term infrastructure needed to sustain it.