FONA is collaborating with University of Melbourne School of Design and IncluDEsign to design of an exemplar education facility for communities in rural and remote areas of Nepal.
A key part of this work is to apply a Collaborative Design Process in a community with deep cultural, spiritual and environmental heritage to co-create the school in collaboration with its stakeholders – the children, teachers, parents and community.
Our visit to the first pilot school drew a lot of curiosity from the children ..
Our aim was ensure that every child had the opportunity to have their voice heard, to share their dreams for their school, village and their future.
Each child provide written responses and drawings to the question
- what do you love about your village?
- what do you want to see in your new school?
From these drawings and responses we are going to extract the themes to inform the design brief. Some of the most obvious themes included:
- Temple
- Water tap
- Nature / mountain views
- Ambulance
- Computer lab
- Peepal tree with a sitting area
- Playground
Our little “co-designers” shared some incredible ideas and forward-thinking vision for their school.
Some samples of children’s drawings:
The significance of the big tree in the school grounds was a major theme in the childrens’ responses.
We love this student’s vision for renewables and solar energy, what a visionary!
And the spiritual and cultural heritage of their place was clearly cherished by the children.
Leave a Reply