{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/110470"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/110470","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"Rural-urban contextual data triangulation for international engineering project work","abstract":"Literature in the field of international engineering indicates that project failure is commonly a direct result of the exclusion of the community during important project and design decisions. This failure appears to be especially prominent for projects attempted in rural communities. The current emerging solution to address this community exclusion and resulting project failure is the application of contextual engineering. This involves a thorough and purposeful on-site study of community conditions with particular attention to social and physical conditions. However, this process is quite costly and time-intensive for foreign engineers to engage with and in times of global travel restrictions, it becomes impossible. This research acknowledges that the consideration of contextual factors is crucial to project success and studies the potential for a community's contextual conditions to be observed from abroad as a way to keep projects operational in situations where travel is not feasible. While rural community-specific data is largely uncommon, urban-level data is examined and interpolation is performed. By selecting the three urban cities, where data is plentiful, in closest proximity by travel distance to the rural community in question and weighting them accordingly, it is hypothesized that a contextual engineering data triangulation analysis can be performed to approximate the conditions of the rural community. This process is tested through a case study of rural Tikonko, Sierra Leone and the results are compared against known community condition data gathered on-site. The results highlight the yet irreplaceable need for on-site interactions while still acknowledging potential avenues of usefulness for this type of remote data collection, as well as future work pathways.","abstract_html":"Literature in the field of international engineering indicates that project failure is commonly a direct result of the exclusion of the community during important project and design decisions. This failure appears to be especially prominent for projects attempted in rural communities. The current emerging solution to address this community exclusion and resulting project failure is the application of contextual engineering. This involves a thorough and purposeful on-site study of community conditions with particular attention to social and physical conditions. However, this process is quite costly and time-intensive for foreign engineers to engage with and in times of global travel restrictions, it becomes impossible. This research acknowledges that the consideration of contextual factors is crucial to project success and studies the potential for a community's contextual conditions to be observed from abroad as a way to keep projects operational in situations where travel is not feasible. While rural community-specific data is largely uncommon, urban-level data is examined and interpolation is performed. By selecting the three urban cities, where data is plentiful, in closest proximity by travel distance to the rural community in question and weighting them accordingly, it is hypothesized that a contextual engineering data triangulation analysis can be performed to approximate the conditions of the rural community. This process is tested through a case study of rural Tikonko, Sierra Leone and the results are compared against known community condition data gathered on-site. The results highlight the yet irreplaceable need for on-site interactions while still acknowledging potential avenues of usefulness for this type of remote data collection, as well as future work pathways.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Timmons, Alexandra Christina"],"institution":"University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"M.S.","degree_level":"Thesis","degree_discipline":"Agricultural & Biological Engr","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Witmer, Ann-Perry","Rodríguez, Luis F","Lleras, Christy L"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2021,"date_issued":"2021-09-17T01:10:50Z","date_published":"2021-09-17T01:10:50Z","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:50Z","subjects":["contextual engineering","international engineering","rural","urban","data triangulation"],"languages":["en"],"rights":["Copyright 2021 Alexandra Timmons"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"http://hdl.handle.net/2142/110470","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Witmer, Ann-Perry","Rodríguez, Luis F","Lleras, Christy L"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Timmons, Alexandra Christina"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2021-09-17T01:10:50Z","2021-04-14","2021-05"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text","Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Agricultural & Biological Engr"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["M.S."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["contextual engineering","international engineering","rural","urban","data triangulation"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2021 Alexandra Timmons"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/110470"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["Literature in the field of international engineering indicates that project failure is commonly a direct result of the exclusion of the community during important project and design decisions. This failure appears to be especially prominent for projects attempted in rural communities. The current emerging solution to address this community exclusion and resulting project failure is the application of contextual engineering. This involves a thorough and purposeful on-site study of community conditions with particular attention to social and physical conditions. However, this process is quite costly and time-intensive for foreign engineers to engage with and in times of global travel restrictions, it becomes impossible. This research acknowledges that the consideration of contextual factors is crucial to project success and studies the potential for a community's contextual conditions to be observed from abroad as a way to keep projects operational in situations where travel is not feasible. While rural community-specific data is largely uncommon, urban-level data is examined and interpolation is performed. By selecting the three urban cities, where data is plentiful, in closest proximity by travel distance to the rural community in question and weighting them accordingly, it is hypothesized that a contextual engineering data triangulation analysis can be performed to approximate the conditions of the rural community. This process is tested through a case study of rural Tikonko, Sierra Leone and the results are compared against known community condition data gathered on-site. The results highlight the yet irreplaceable need for on-site interactions while still acknowledging potential avenues of usefulness for this type of remote data collection, as well as future work pathways.","Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2021-09-16 without embargo terms","The student, Alexandra Timmons, accepted the attached license on 2021-04-13 at 22:09.","The student, Alexandra Timmons, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2021-04-13 at 22:45.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2021-04-14 at 14:48.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #16316 on 2021-09-16 at 16:41:14","Made available in DSpace on 2021-09-17T01:10:50Z (GMT). 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The current emerging solution to address this community exclusion and resulting project failure is the application of contextual engineering. This involves a thorough and purposeful on-site study of community conditions with particular attention to social and physical conditions. However, this process is quite costly and time-intensive for foreign engineers to engage with and in times of global travel restrictions, it becomes impossible. This research acknowledges that the consideration of contextual factors is crucial to project success and studies the potential for a community's contextual conditions to be observed from abroad as a way to keep projects operational in situations where travel is not feasible. While rural community-specific data is largely uncommon, urban-level data is examined and interpolation is performed. By selecting the three urban cities, where data is plentiful, in closest proximity by travel distance to the rural community in question and weighting them accordingly, it is hypothesized that a contextual engineering data triangulation analysis can be performed to approximate the conditions of the rural community. This process is tested through a case study of rural Tikonko, Sierra Leone and the results are compared against known community condition data gathered on-site. The results highlight the yet irreplaceable need for on-site interactions while still acknowledging potential avenues of usefulness for this type of remote data collection, as well as future work pathways.","Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2021-09-16 without embargo terms","The student, Alexandra Timmons, accepted the attached license on 2021-04-13 at 22:09.","The student, Alexandra Timmons, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2021-04-13 at 22:45.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2021-04-14 at 14:48.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #16316 on 2021-09-16 at 16:41:14","Made available in DSpace on 2021-09-17T01:10:50Z (GMT). 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