Fourah Bay College offers a range of undergraduate and postgraduate programs designed to equip students with essential skills and knowledge. Our Continuous General Civil Engineering program leads to a Bachelor of Engineering (B. Eng.) degree, providing students with a solid foundation in engineering principles.

In addition to engineering, we emphasize the importance of water and sanitation in our communities. Our program, 'Water and Sanitation', evaluates the role of NGOs in establishing essential water and sanitation facilities for rural populations in Sierra Leone.

Furthermore, we are proud to introduce the 'Water for Survival' initiative, a sub-local program focused on enhancing water and sanitation access.

For students interested in the arts, our English Department is developing a comprehensive Theater Arts Program, aiming to foster creativity and cultural expression. We are committed to planning and implementing strategies that will enhance our offerings in the field of aesthetic activities.

Smart Thermostats and the Engineering Skills Behind Them

The title of this page points to a fast-growing corner of building technology: smart thermostats. These are networked controllers that learn occupancy patterns, respond to sensors and adjust heating or cooling automatically. In temperate markets they mainly manage heating. In a tropical city like Freetown the more relevant question is how similar control systems can manage air conditioning, ventilation and power use in offices, laboratories and student residences.

For engineering students, smart thermostats are a useful case study because they bring several disciplines together in one small device:

  • Control engineering: setpoints, feedback loops and scheduling logic that keep a room comfortable without wasting energy.
  • Electronics and sensing: temperature, humidity and occupancy sensors, and the microcontrollers that read them.
  • Building services: how insulation, shading, orientation and airflow affect cooling loads. Civil engineers deal with these factors from the design stage.
  • Energy systems: where grid supply is unreliable, controls that work with generators, solar panels and batteries matter as much as the thermostat itself.

The wider lesson is that

Also on this site: THE UNIQUE METHOD · Athletics events · Think they were two trade