Category Archives: Projects

A Cool Paradigm Shift in Education

Posted by on August 10, 2011 No comments

An incredible TED Talk by the famous Salman Khan who just happens to be a very good teacher, especially in math and the sciences. His premise, after posting up youtubes for his cousins to help them with their homework (and then went super viral), is that teachers today could assign youtube videos for homework and then use the classroom to do homework. This was actually done by some teachers after they found out that his videos were the preferred instructional method vs the one-size-fits-all lecture style today.

Let’s get our kids out of the “swiss cheese” gaps of education today.

Systems Thinking with the Xavier Boys

Posted by on March 27, 2011 No comments

The greatest inventors and inventions of our time are necessarily systems- just for the fact that it is not a single invention, but an integration of many inventions that work harmoniously together. Systems such as how water, food, or electricity is delivered, how private and public transport keep a city humming, how computers and telecom interface with finance, healthcare, or even music, is not just about being creative or having a great idea. It is serious discipline of thought and requires an extraordinary ability to see emergent properties before they actually happen.

As the boys embarked on their project to come up with some systems solutions for Manila’s green problems, they tried their best to learn from what Singapore has done. Being a small city-state, every square foot of land is precious and planning is essential to ensure a certain quality of life.

Planning a City

Managed Growth

What works better than Color Coding? Charging motorists based on Use

Greenifying the Cities of the World

After a mere 6 days of intensive work and play, the boys presented their ideas at Pioneer Junior College. Although the ideas were not entirely original (is there anything new under the sun after all?), the thought behind the business plans showed that they were indeed thinking in terms of systems and applied it well in local terms. Indeed, everyone put on great work, showing good detail, planning, and market potential. However, of the six, one in particular stood out.

The main reason for their win is due to what Howard Shaw (Executive Director, Singapore Environment Council) said when he met with them. “The purpose of SEC is to educate, to assist, and to inspire government, society and industry. It is easy to educate. It is not that hard to assist. But it is very difficult to inspire.” Truly, what the green movement requires now is a change of heart, a change in behaviour, and what the group presented may not work, but in it are definitely the seeds that can inspire large-scale change.

For us, we are inspired by all their ideas (even those that did not get mentioned in presentation), energy, and willingness to do something better. We look forward to seeing their work in the future.

(All photos by Jonard Koa)

Helping Others, Helping Ourselves

Posted by on March 31, 2010 3 comments

Last week, a group of students from Singapore International School in Hong Kong paid a visit to the Philippines with the intention to help out in the communities that needed a helping hand. Aside from participating in “feeding programmes” for orphanages and community centres, they also organised the library and created important visual aids for the science teachers to help them with their lessons.

Many of the schools do not have any funding at all for materials other than books (and even that is not enough) so visual aids often have to be paid for and made by the teachers themselves who are already overworked because of the large classroom sizes which can go up to 90 students.

So the 3D models they made which included the solar system, water cycles, photosynthesis and the systems of the body will go a long way, helping thousands of kids better understand science and hopefully dream bigger dreams in the process.