Smart Pune - Ideas to make Pune a better and smarter city.

 Yesterday 16/ July/ 2015 I shared with my class- MYP2 the

http://smartcity.punecorporation.org/

“Maza Swapna, Smart Pune” is a contest which is an effort to connect YOU as a citizen, to your local government.

Pune’s rich culture of social movements is the foundation on which this Samvad is taking place. Pune has historically been a culturally rich, educational and beautiful city but with urbanization all over, concerns such as land scarcity, resource shortage, pollution and traffic delays are increasing. Cities grappling with these concerns need to think of smart ways and leverage technology before things go out of control. The city of Pune, with its vision to become a cleaner, greener and more liveable city, plans to go smart with focus on mitigating concerns related to sewerage, water supply, road and transport as well as solid waste management.

Prior to undertaking this journey of transformation, Pune Municipal Corporation wishes to hear from ‘YOU’, the citizens who are the most important part of the city we call home. We invite you to come and participate in the Survey & Best Smart City Idea competition and share your views about how we can make Pune a better and smarter city. Your responses shall help us incorporate your inputs and emerge as a winner in the list of 10 cities that will undertake the smart city journey from Government of Maharashtra.

the reaction to this as soon as they came to know they had to write ideas, they were like No we don't want to do this except one out of the group of 15 students said he is interested and immediately noted down the link.

---- this is due to the fear that my idea will not win, is not good or i do not get ideas was my understanding. When i told them we will do this together a few got interested.

Today when again i got 30 min with them, i motivated them thats lets brainstorm for the same and find out areas on which we can work and need to improve to make Pune Better.

As I started the session, i did not make it compulsory for all to participate, but the ones who initially backed out got interested and started interacting more.

  

This session was more of sensitizing the students towards the finding the scope and design opportunities. Now in the next session -- we will start working on ideas.

Lets see how it progresses.....

Yesterday 28/July/2015
I had a talk with MYP2 kids on their understanding of what is design, they started talking about the design cycle, How the research and analyse before they come up with ideas and than create a product. they could relate to the cycle with help of examples and what they did in MYP1 in their product design class. But when i came to the question are they all creative some shy off the denying the fact everyone is creative. This needs to be made very clear that they all can think creatively and get ideas.

Than coming to the topic of better Pune Smart city, i had one student who came forward to share his idea. He spoke about upliftment of slum dwellers. The government already has redevelopment plans for them , but these people refuse to stay in the built up houses because the cost of water and light is more, which he gathered information by inquiring about it with his elders in the house. For this his solution was to subsidize their electricity and water charges and providing them with better employment opportunities and education for their children free of cost and free food.

I am happy to see the way he analysed a problem and thought about the solutions on what can be done. At the age of 12 to think on these line is also very good. he had more ideas but our lesson time got over and he could not share it with all of us.

He was motivated to work towards this project from the beginning, and i am hopeful that the rest of the class also gets motivated. :)