1) The Bala Janaagraha program by Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy provides civic education to school children to encourage active citizenship. It involves classroom lessons, a hands-on civic project addressing an issue in their community, and a civic fest competition. 2) Students conduct surveys and analyze issues related to a road in their area, provide a quality score, and propose solutions. They present their findings to local leaders to encourage action. 3) The program aims to develop civic awareness and responsibility in over 25,000 students across India. It fosters creative, analytical thinking and problem-solving skills. Student projects have addressed issues like road infrastructure and generated innovative solutions.

2. CONTENT
Mentor, January 2016 Volume 9, Issue 8
05 06
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10
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26
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Sultan Speaks
...
Early Literacy
Children develop much
of their capacity for
learning in the first three
years of life…
The Invisible
Curriculum
Children learn values by
seeing adults around
them...
Vertical Grouping
I know, I wonder, I
predict is my method...
Educating children
against all odds
Recognition ignites the fire
in teachers who are not
looked-up by our society
today...
IPSC Report
Report Galleria...
Hole-in-the-Wall
Learning stations and
academic performance
among rural children in
India...
Mentor Conclave
Thoughts and Feedback
Addressing
developmental stages
Propagating age
appropriate learning in
children in the pre-school...
On being a good citizen
Providing civic education to
children in schools...
Cover Story
Teachers are in the
unenviable position of
being stuck between a
rock and a hard space...
Post Scriptum
Forever indebted to you…
Pedagogy
School
Leadership
Mentor
Thoughts
School
GovernanceInnovation
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IN THE SPOTLIGHT
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Importance of Civic Awareness
Urban planning has long been seen a
rescuer of India’s—and indeed the world’s—
increasing population problem. Mainstream
urban planning however is largely absent,
debilitated or goes unnoticed. Having said
that, we need urban planners working with
active citizens who care about the city they
live in.
By virtue of its format, the Civic Project under
the Bala Janaagraha program develops in
school children a deep sense of awareness
and responsibility towards the community.
At some levels, the seeds of being a better
citizen are sown here. One might argue
that at the age of thirteen this might be
premature. But there is hope. There is also
the rationale that by actively doing a project
that concerns their home and city directly,
students will grow to be irreplaceable agents
who achieve sustainable development in
the future.
“By including participants who belong to
Std. VIII, Bala Janaagraha is doing a great
job at grassroot level”, notes Principal Vijaya
Desai of Somalwar Nikalas High School,
Nagpur. She is among a growing number of
principals and schools who take pride and
enthusiastically motivate their student to
take part in a unique civic fest organized by
Bal Janaagraha across India.
Learning in the trenches
The Bala Janaagraha program is an
interactive child-focused pedagogy with
three core components: a structured module
of classroom sessions, a hands-on practical
civic project and a civic fest which is an
exciting platform for students to showcase
their civic projects
Part of this is the awareness program:
I-Change-My-City. As a curriculum it is
poles apart from typical civic lessons
taught in schools. The curriculum aims at
explaining ‘quality of life’ in the context of
local governance, its key aspects and their
thoughts and opinions on these. Along with
it, the curriculum works in explaining what
‘active citizenship’ means to children with
special focus on imbibing ‘civic sense’.
SCHOOL GOVERNANCE
ON BEING A GOOD CITIZEN
Civics remains an important part of school curriculum in India and
yet active citizenship in India is far removed from reality. Urban
development, planning and infrastructure maintenance by the public
only occurs in scattered parts of the country. Often, being a good
citizen in India means having copious amounts of endurance level.
It is then that we must look at children to possess civic virtue and foster
in them the desire to do community service. Informed and involved citizenry means children
are aware and actively conscious of their local governing environment.
In this context, the non-profit Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy (JCCD)
under its Bala Janaagraha program provides civic education to school children. Class VIII
students are encouraged to be active citizens by engaging them in a live project that aims
at teaching active citizenship and becoming informed citizens, writes Chaitanya Deshpande
from EduMedia India Pvt. Ltd. to MENTOR.

4. 27
January 2016
27
Hence, school children don’t just learn by
rote the civic administration structure, they
are encouraged to influence it. The theme
this year focused on “understanding urban
planning and design through our roads”.
Being a hands-on program, the students
also learn to identify key actors of local
governance and their roles. They learn to
relate quality of life to the functioning of these
actors and how they can be made more
responsive by practicing active citizenship.
At its core, however, lies the idea that school
students also must understand how to source
data to make evidence-based decisions
on every day civic issues and how to work
together—and with local governance—to
solve these. Via the curriculum, the students
are instigated to be catalysts of change. As
a teaching methodology, the policy of the
program is to foster creative thinking, inspire
analytical thinking and create a problem-
solving approach in the young citizens of
India.
In itself, the project is simple: group of children
choose one road near their schools or home,
carry out a survey, analyze the road and
understand its positives and negatives and
then find solutions to its problems. This road
is given a Quality Score by the students.
They measure the road, its width and length,
interview the residents, businesses, experts,
officials—everyone who uses the road.
The concept of giving a Quality Score
is fascinating. As citizens, the students
while doing the project learn to prescribe
accountability to persistent infrastructural
problems on the road selected. Students
then present their findings via a written report,
a presentation that involves skits, slogan-
making, and even singing to showcase
and highlight their research in a city-wide
competition. Each team also writes to (or
meets) local ward members and corporator
to get their feedback and response on
action being taken. Ultimately, the project
is about children being able to measure the
quality of life around the street or road. This
is something that children can learn at an
early age and extend to the town, state and
even the country.
Activating Public Participation
The Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship
and Democracy (JCCD) that runs the Bala
Janaagraha program has the objective to
improve the quality of life of urban citizens
with Urban Governance as the focus.
JCCD works with citizens by catalyzing
active citizenship in neighborhoods, local
administration and governments to institute
reforms in city-systems. As a hyper-local
social change network, Janaagraha has
created a community of citizens keen on
solving civic issues in a city.
With Janaagraha, fixing civic issues is simple.
All one has to do is post a complaint on the site
(www.ichangemycity.com). This complaint
is then up-voted based on its seriousness or
priority by an active community of 3,16,677
users and is then passed on to the local civic

5. 28 www.mentormagazine.net
January 2016
28
administration and elected representatives
who ensure that the complaint is resolved.
In Bengaluru, this initiative has been a work
of inspiration and resulted in successful
resolution of some stubborn civic problems in
the city of Bengaluru like potholes on busy
Bommanahalli Junction, excessive garbage
accumulation in Bhadrappa Layout, and
even intermittent water supply in Shanthi
Nagar area to name a few. To date, the
I-Change-My-City initiative has 94,737
complaints posted and 36,627 successfully
resolved complaints.
But this initiative is making a greater impact
in schools. The innovative ‘I-Change-My-City’
curriculum and the road project encourage
children to solve civic problems around them
and thus impact society positively. Specially
designed textbooks in six Indian languages
(Marathi, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu,
Kannada and Hindi) are made available
for the program. The impact numbers of the
program are large: 25 cities, 531 schools and
40,000 students. As a civic-oriented project,
the students understand the value of urban
planning and various factors which form the
basic focus of city plans.
Change is coming
The program is a success if numbers are to go
by. This year, close to 25,000 students from 266
schools across India have participated in the
‘I-Change-My-City’ program. In Bengaluru
alone, the number is 9,000 students from a
100 private, public and government schools.
There is more than just numbers. Students
have responded to this hands-on method of
learning by working on projects tougher than
expected. A case in the point is the brilliant
example of the ten-member student group
from The East-West School in Bengaluru.
Early in the year, they wanted to find a
solution to the poor state of Susheela Road
near their school in Basavanagudi area of
South Bengaluru. Here they zeroed in on
piezoelectric footpaths: a foot step on the
Piezo tile that can generate 0.05 watts of
electricity, which can then be used to light
up street lamps on the stretch. Subsequently,
the team contacted a UK-based company
that manufactures the tiles that convert
mechanical energy into electricity. The plan
is to lay tiles and generate electricity to light
street lamps along the 556-metre long road.
The group also received an anonymous
donation of Rs. 200,000.
Yet another example is of a group of students
who ensured that the local corporator made
arrangements for a CCTV system to be fitted
near a garbage bin. The idea was to dissuade
people from throwing the waste while riding
two-wheelers or walking. Another example
is of the students of Bhavan’s BVM Srikrishna
Nagar (Nagpur) who made a report on the
condition of the Central Avenue road in
Nagpur and envisioned a system wherein
speed breakers could be converted into a
source of power generation, triggered by
pressure of vehicles passing over it!
These are just but few stories of innovative
and excellent citizenship by the students
inspired by the Bala Janaagraha program.
The Civic Fest enters its zonal stage where city
winners will compete at Zonal Finals to qualify
for the national finals. Slated to be held in
February next year, the finals in Bengaluru will
see the top four school teams present their
innovative projects for the grand prize.
There is certainly a glimmer of hope where
we can see active citizenship become a
norm. Amidst dismal institutional failings, this
program seems to bring strength to the idea
of citizenship. What needs to be kept in mind
is that such transformational impact is not
a product of spontaneity but constructive
planning.
Note:
You too can be a part of the civic awareness
campaign by downloading the mobile app
“I Change My City” Google Play and the
App Store of iOS or visiting the site:
www.ichangemycity.com
chaitanya@edumedia.in
As a teaching methodology, the policy
of the program is to foster creative
thinking, inspire analytical thinking and
create a problem-solving approach in
the young citizens of India