is Associate Professor of engineering and physics, Elizabethtown College. DeGoede is currently working on developing a collaborative study abroad program in West Africa built around a design course based in service engineering. Many of these projects include work with renewable energy systems. His research interests are in the areas of biomechanics and the modeling of dynamic systems. Current projects include collaborative work with faculty and students in occupational therapy and an orthopedic hand surgeon, developing clinical instruments for conducting therapy and assessing human movement in patients undergoing rehabilitation.

This paper outlines a developing model for engaging in community based service learning projects in a developing country (The Gambia, West Africa). The model here strives to foster multicultural teams of students collaborating in multicultural peer to peer teams. When the solutions to problems of "local and global public good" are developed in situ, the local population is empowered to solve other related problems and sustain any system developed over the expected life of that system. This program recognizes the existing pattern of dependency, and is designed to overcome that pattern by working side by side with Gambian university students and faculty, along with community leaders.

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