Steelcase

EveryBody Can Change By Design (EBCD) was launched as CSR initiative of Steelcase Asia Pacific Holdings India Private which was catalyzed by Drstikona Consultancy and Program management services Pvt Ltd. and Nalanda Foundation was the service provider. The project was started on November 14, 2017, and it was successfully completed on March 31, 2018. EBCD's main motive was to empower and educate school children who belong to underprivileged communities. This program engaged schools of rural societies to become creative Problem-Solvers through a customized "Design Thinking process". Two schools i.e. Govt. Sr. Secondary School, Daulatabad, Gurgaon Rural, Haryana and CD School, Sector-48, Gurugram, Haryana, were targeted in rural Haryana to conduct the project. Using the 4-step design thinking framework "Understand-Ideate-Create-Test" solutions, children were encouraged to "UNDERSTAND" any situation that bothers them, "IDEATE" a way to make it better, "CREATE" and put into action the change, and "SHARE"-their story with the world to further inspire others. 120 children from Grade 8, 9, 11 from 2 schools in rural Haryana went through a structured curriculum in Design Thinking with over 20 hours of inputs in the form of classroom and mentoring sessions and fieldwork. Children were made to walk through a real-life challenge from their own lives and were encouraged to arrive at simple solutions. The children themselves identified the Problems/Area of improvement and came up with creative ways to solve them proving that they have what it takes to be able to 'design' a future that is desired and sustainable. The whole program was conducted in two phases: "Design Program 1.0" which included 273 children and "Design Program 2.0" which involved 120 children. Children were divided into teams of 4-6 members each and in the end, they presented 24 Project Ideas. Those ideas were solving their day-to-day problems/requirements and ranged from enabling the woman of the house to work to preventing pipeline leakage to save water. With the help of induction, workshops and few key activities which included Research and Designing of Curriculum, Curriculum Implementation, and Mentoring, Presentations of the Ideas, 154 children were able to complete "Design Thinking 1.0" and 120 children successfully completed "Design Thinking 2.0" which help them getting equipped with life skills, enabled them to think in a creative manner and this whole process can help them play a role in shaping their communities to lead a better future.