Innovate

While we found increasing success with online classes, the experience of school goes far beyond the realms of the classroom alone. And so, everything that our physical school stood for needed to find its own voice and space online. 2020 gave us the perfect opportunity to innovate.Our events were reimagined to suit the online space – be it our annual flagship experiences, or entirely new ones.

Funkaar Week celebrated the coming together of multiple perspectives and dimensions towards holistic, experiential learning. A different world of possibilities was introduced to the students this year, with activities including video exchanges and experiments, interactive storytelling sessions and virtual tours. Collaboration, exploration, discovery and reflection were integral parts of the week.

Anandam, the celebratory culmination of our year-long AHA! learnings also found itself in a shiny new online avatar. The performances were gripping across the board, and the visual arts basket had its time in the spotlight too owing to its innovative approach.

Our IB students’ had their CAS Cultural Day (called “Ressentir” this year at Shiv Nadar School Gurgaon) which was received with equal aplomb.
 


Without meeting physically even once, Kaafila, our student-led and student-organised festival celebrating the arts crossed international borders, reaching out to 500+ students and 20+ schools. Kaafila also featured a digital “Arts’ Haat” through which artists impacted due to the pandemic could sell their work online.

In order to mark the International Day of People with Disabilities in December, Ability Week celebrations were held across all three campuses. The week featured awareness-building activities for students, parents, teachers and staff as well as expert-led dialogue and fora.

We had the month-long Energy Bootcamp with participation from 2000+ students and featuring scientists and luminaries from all across the world. Taking advantage of the fact that it was fully digital, we also had virtual international guided nuclear reactor tours, virtual science experiments, a Youth Parliament and much more.  

For the first time this year, we introduced an integrated academic fest “Synkalo” – organised by Shiv Nadar School Noida, and featuring participation and collaboration across all three campuses, multiple competitive and non-competitive events were held in breaking walls between the scholastic and co-scholastic domains.

Inarguably, the event showcasing the most innovation and inventiveness of all was Colloquium 2020. Held with gusto and fully reimagined for the online space, Grade 10 students from Shiv Nadar School Faridabad, Noida and Gurgaon brought their best innovations to the table – this year’s winners were Team Postura – with a sleek, portable and cost-effective device to address bad posture issues.

Our runners up, Team SAFE, innovated a rotating, UV-lit, auto-sanitizing bench which aims to reduce the risk of infectious diseases. And the audience choice winner was Team Sewage Squad – their machine aims to entirely eradicate the menace of manual scavenging in India.

All the student teams were received with warmth, encouragement and awe, the only difference this year being that we went entirely digital. Our esteemed jury consisted of ...

Through learning and innovation, our community was able to stand resilient in the face of uncertainty. In our next article, we recount another crucial part of our process - exploration – as our learners and educators found their voice, venturing beyond the digital boundaries of school.

Jan 27, 2021 by Shiv Nadar School