Since 2013, BUILD has been a tradition of unity on Texas A&M’s campus. The student organization has spent the last 10 years bringing individuals from across campus together to achieve a common goal – to design, construct and deploy Texas Aggie Medical Clinics around the world.

The organization was founded by the 2012-2013 Deputy Corps Commander, Bryson Sutterfield ’13 in reverence of the 12 Aggies who lost their lives in the 1999 bonfire collapse.

“The idea was to do something that was in the same spirit of what bonfire provided for students on campus, which was a central project where students had to put effort and sweat and time into building something together,” Sutterfield said. What started as a project within the Corps of Cadets as a way for Fish to earn Corps Brass turned into an opportunity to tie individuals from all sides of campus together.

“You don't have to look far to find students at Texas A&M willing to sacrifice their personal time,” Sutterfield said. That mission of bringing Aggies together has carried over to the present generation of BUILD leaders. Over the past decade, BUILD has converted over 40 shipping containers into medical clinics that have been shipped all over the world.

"It feels kind of surreal,” said BUILD CEO Kate-Riley Rogers ’23. “Taking over during the 10-year anniversary and hearing all the different alumni and even the founders coming back and expressing how wonderful it is to see how BUILD has grown over the years.”

For the 2023-2024 academic year, BUILD will construct five clinics, including their first veterinary clinic. The Texas Aggie Veterinary Clinic (TAVC) was made possible by a collaboration between BUILD and students at the Texas A&M School of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences. In Dr. Leslie Easterwood’s Community Service in Veterinary Medicine course, students completed a semester-long project in which they were tasked with planning and designing a veterinary service project concept using a 40-foot shipping container. The winning design was completed by third year veterinary students Beth Briscoe, Stephanie Cavazos, Alexandria Inbody, Kathryn Herin, Macy Friedrich and Kaitlyn Turany.

The veterinary clinic will go to South Texas Animal Rescue (STAR) in Corpus Christi, Texas. STAR’s goal is to expand accessible veterinary care in underserved communities and the clinic will help support that mission.

The other four clinics will go to Ukraine, Nigeria, Chad and Turkey to provide medical care access to communities in need. The semester’s five projects will be made possible by close to 200 students on BUILD’s command team or in student supervisor roles. Rogers said that she thinks Aggies’ willingness to serve is what has made BUILD so successful after the last decade.

“What we do at the scale we do it is really hard to replicate,” Rogers said. “Aggies have such a strong focus and urge to serve the community.”

That focus has allowed the organization to grow from a group of just over 10 individuals to an organization hundreds of members strong.

Read more about BUILD’s mission and projects on the organization’s website. To help the organization continue it's mission of selfless service, you can give through the Texas A&M Foundation website or contact Reagan Chessher at givetostudentaffairs@txamfoundation.com or 979-458-1689.