Q4
Celebrating our Little Champions of Change
2013-14
ACHIEVEMENTS First ever Bala Janaagraha National Level Civic Fest The 7th of February saw 13 teams from 11 cities converge on Bangalore to participate in the first ever Bala Janaagraha National Level Civic Fest. This year’s theme was urban roads, and participating teams (selected from over 1500 entrants) took turns to present their outstanding projects. The eminent panel of judges, which included Dr.Bibhudutta Baral, Dr.H.R.Shantharajanna, and Mrs. Mala Ramadorai had a tough time picking the winners, but eventually Delhi Public School (Ludhiana), The Chanda Devi Saraf School (Nagpur), Little Flower Public School (Bangalore) were given first, second, and third prize for their excellent work. An exciting element of the fest was the inclusion of a Social Media Kiosk, where students were able to register, capture videos, post blogs, and tweet their opinions and experiences during the course of the programme. This is part of our efforts to make technology an integral part of the Bala Janaagraha programme. Going forward we’ll continue to educate our students about using digital and online technologies more effectively.
The National Level fest will be the critical culmination of each year’s programme in the years ahead. We believe that by recognizing students work and giving them a formal platform to present it, we can further instill a deep sense of civic pride in our most outstanding students. We hope this will encourage them to become responsible citizens and engaged custodians of our future cities.
National Level Fest Winner Team DPS Ludhiana
Highlights of National Fest http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nWiuiiSs8g
The National Level Fest was also an opportunity for us to celebrate our 2013-14 Little Champions of Change (eight teams/individual students from Pune, Patna, Mumbai and Bangalore). The Little Champions of Change initiative recognizes 8th graders who, during the course of the programme, have initiated and implemented significant civic work in their neighborhoods. This year, Little Champions of Change were shortlisted from amongst 18 nominations through a selection process by a panel of judges. This year our champions of change included: Ridhi Singh, Saman Jawaid, Nidhi from Delhi Public School, Patna who raised awareness in a nearby slum regarding cleanliness. The slum is inhabited by manual scavengers, a group of people long forgotten not only by the public but also by government bodies. On seeing the children do their bit, the government officials are now visiting the slum to provide basic amenities. http://youtu.be/jIWEG79xjt0 Salwa Cisekar, Rutuja Paraskar, Aishwarya Sood of Sadhu Vaswani International School, Mumbai, embarked on a journey to improve slum-dwellers’ quality of life. They got the area cleared of waste. They also ensured that parking lanes were made in the vicinity to avoid haphazard parking. They plan to install bins for collecting dry and wet waste in every road near their school with the help of the area corporator. http://youtu.be/BVu0nG9dKFQ