Harris Trobman, locals, and children working to make Haiti a more sustainable place to live
Image Credit: Harris Trobman
The Landscape Architecture Foundation’s prestigious Olmsted Scholars Program recognized two University of Maryland scholars for their outstanding work in the field of landscape architecture. Master of Landscape Architecture student Harris Trobman was named one of only six National Olmsted Scholar Finalists. Meanwhile, Dorsa Afsharjavin, who completed a bachelor’s in landscape architecture from UMD in December, was chosen as a University Olmsted Scholar. Each year, the Olmsted Scholars Program recognizes one outstanding student from each accredited landscape architecture program in the U.S. and Canada, along with the jury-selected graduate and undergraduate national award winners and finalists.
Trobman, who was also a member of the first place EPA Campus Rainworks Challenge team, was recognized in part for his substantial work in Haiti where he was able to apply landscape architecture knowledge to ensure that basic health needs such as water, clean air, good sanitation, and shelter are being met.
“The question of how to meet these needs while meeting the social [problem] of increased populations and economic needs has really driven my passion,” Trobman said.
As an undergraduate at Delaware Valley University, Trobman designed a green roof system for community food and water as a part of his capstone studio project eventually designing and installing two rooftop systems in Port-au-Prince, Haiti on a nine-day trip with students and professors.
“This proved to be a cornerstone to my passion for holistic change,” Trobman explained. “Not only were these gardens unique in the sense that they brought the color green to a city covered in grey, but they were also made out of materials that can be commonly found in Haiti, like oil drums.”
As a University of Maryland graduate student, Trobman has continued to act on his passion for improving lives around the world. For his master’s thesis, he concentrated on another Haitian community by providing access to clean drinking water through a sand filter that captures rainwater in an underground cistern, installing a green roof to grow vegetables and herbs, designing an improved latrine, as well as building a playground out of repurposed tires. “I worked on finding and adapting proven techniques to grow food, filter water, and create social spaces,” Trobman said.
For ten days in the beginning of March, Trobman put his plan into action at a 600-student campus in Haiti with the assistance of three volunteers from Pennsylvania. Locals collected waste items such as tires, plastic bottles, rice sacks and cardboard, and approximately 30 local children participated in the project (motivated by lollipops) by painting tires, mixing soil, making a wind chime, and drawing a picture of what they wanted their playground to look like: a soccer field.
“As soon as the goal posts made out of locally harvested bamboo were erected, the children moved quickly to finish their field,” Trobman recalled. “It was so fulfilling to see and now hear stories of how the children and locals are using the space.”
Moving forward, Trobman will help design environmental curriculum to raise awareness about environmental problems in Haiti such as the burning of waste in rivers, beaches, canals, and issues of deforestation (less than four percent of Haiti’s forest remains) for an environmental education class that the school will offer. Next fall, a climbing structure, musical play, and a tire swing will be installed on the playground.
“The real power of this project and my ongoing studies is the potential to teach elementary students how to improve their quality of life….the basics for filtering their own water, growing their own vegetables, and practicing better sanitation and hygiene,” Trobman said. “The idea is not to change the world on a large scale but rather to allow the process to evolve over time [by] looking at what is available as a guide to what can be done.”
As a National Olmsted Scholar finalist, Trobman is the recipient of a $1,000 award. “I am truly honored to be among the best landscape architecture students in the country,” Trobman concluded. “I think it shows what a great program we have at Maryland, [and] it also shows that people view the importance of my socially engaged design [which] is important in realizing the world’s needs.”
