Hearing the marginalized: How Indian Jan Sunwais help the voiceless speak, learn and act
To uncover and heal grievances on public issues, Jan Sunwai use a public hearing format and skilled facilitators to guide debate and emotions.
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City Participatory Budgeting is a popular collective intelligence practice found in western urban governance systems, and it is rapidly gaining popularity globally. School Participatory Budgeting (School PB) is inspired from this methodology, while applying it to the microcosm of school communities. This case study explores School PB as a method of educating youth in applying principles of collective intelligence to improve governance systems within school communities, paving the way for a more collaboration-minded generation for the future.
The academic calendars of the students involved need to be considered before planning the PB schedule, so that students are not preoccupied with exams when important phases of the project are occurring.
Communication regarding the project needs to be co created by the organizational student team in and school management.
Ensure that the winning project of the exercise is implemented within a realistic time frame. Students need to be shown that their time and effort in contributing to a participatory process within the democratic framework of their school community will yield positive results after all.
The organizing team and school management should reinforce the principle that students who participate in the process will actively contribute to the improvement of their school community. This principle needs to be communicated con-sistently and often to all students, because this is the underlying objective of the exercise in and of itself.
Inspiration, key principles, practical do’s and don’ts
In open acess thanks to the Porticus Foundation
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To uncover and heal grievances on public issues, Jan Sunwai use a public hearing format and skilled facilitators to guide debate and emotions.
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