Award-winning ‘Design for Change’ Founder Inspires Singapore Educators and Students

June 11, 2012

Kiran Bir Sethi, the founder of Design for Change (DFC) (link) programme, was in Singapore from 14-15 May 2012 to speak with schools and educators on how design-led thinking can add value to the education system. DFC was last featured in Singapore as the winner of the Work category in the INDEX: Award 2011 Exhibition (link) which took place from 4-19 February 2012.

Kiran inspired students from nine schools by sharing stories of children making a positive difference to their communities: how children in India stopped child marriages in their village, addressed issue of packaged foods in Bhutan and took the task of cleaning their beaches in Brazil.

At another dialogue session with policy makers, principals and senior faculty members, she encouraged them to empower students to undertake design-led social change so that every student says ‘I CAN’ instead of ‘Can I?’. Kiran shared that design-led thinking adds value to the education system by teaching children to think and develop skills needed today and by giving them the freedom to choose in order to create curious, competent citizens of the future.
 

(Image courtesy of SoCh in Action)

Read more about her talks in Singapore on Social Change in Action (link) and publichouse.sg (link).

About Design for Change 
Design for Change (link) is the largest global movement designed to give children an opportunity to express their own ideas for a better world and put them into action. (Follow this link to see her speak about DFC at the TED conference). Children and adults learn through the Design for Change Challenge that “I Can” are the two most powerful words a person can believe. Children who have discovered this are changing their world.

This year, Design for Change reaches 34 countries and over 300,000 schools inspiring hundreds of thousands of children, their teachers and parents, to celebrate the fact change is possible and that they can lead that change! The challenge asks students to do four very simple things: Feel, Imagine, Do and Share. Children are dreaming up and leading brilliant ideas all over the world, from challenging age-old superstitions in rural communities, to earning their own money to finance school computers to solving the problem of heavy school bags – children are proving that they have what it takes to be able to ‘design’ a future that is desirable.

In Singapore, Social Change in Action (link to SoCh in Action) has organised the DFC Singapore Challenge (link) since 2010. Last year, 450 students participated from 27 schools and their projects were featured at the year-end ‘Change Exposition’ which last took place on 12 November 2011 at *SCAPE.

About INDEX: Award 2011 Exhibition in Singapore 
INDEX: Award 2011 Exhibition (link), produced by the Danish non-profit organisation, INDEX: Design to Improve Life® (link), was held from 4 – 19 February 2012 in Singapore. The exhibition in Singapore was made possible with the support of Keppel Corporation and was organised and hosted by the DesignSingapore Council.