World Water Day essay competition winner speaks on water changes

By Sarah Fries, Lyles College of Engineering media and communications assistant

Civil engineering student Carlos Herrera-Madrigal was recently awarded by Fresno State’s Department of Civil and Geomatics Engineering for the essay he submitted for the World Water Day essay contest. 

World Water Day is an annual United Nations Observance that celebrates water and inspires action to tackle the global water crisis through communication and advocacy. 

In collaboration with the Civil Engineering department, the California Water Institute hosted a community event that brought together attendees through hands-on activities, hearing from a panel of water experts, networking with engineering industry professionals, and more.

To get students more involved with World Water Day, the Civil Engineering department created an essay contest. Students were prompted to write a 500-word essay on whether the Central Valley can survive without more water. The awards were announced at the event and everyone who entered was recognized for their essay.

Herrera-Madrigal wrote his essay on the complexity of changing water habits for people of the Central Valley. 

He said that change won’t be as simple as making a law and telling people to follow it. It will include so much more; asking how the farmers' crops are doing and what they’re growing, rather than telling them they only have a certain amount of water they can use as an example. 

“It’s going to be a very big group effort,” said Herrera-Madrigal. 

While Herrera-Madrigal will be working with water, his main goal is to work with water distribution systems. He plans on working with Provost and Pritchard, a consulting group here in the Valley, on a municipalities team this coming summer.  

“I like a lot of what Provost and Pritchard does because they’ll go out to very rural communities like Poplar, Tipton, Terabella…” said Herrera-Madrigal. 

He said that because those small communities do not have a main water line, and the city does not have a city engineer, Provost and Pritchard will get hired to make those water infrastructures for those communities.

Herrera-Madrigal wants to emphasize on teaching people how their water infrastructures work so they can gain knowledge about how to better utilize the water they receive. 

“I also enjoy the outreach side of it,” said Herrera-Madrigal. 

Herrera-Madrigal is a senior and will graduate from Fresno State in the fall of 2024.