A city cozy for everyone: Mogilev hosted a creathon The First Ideas: Inclusivity for senior schoolers

Second regional creathon for senior schoolers took place on 1 February in Mogilev in the framework of social –educational project The First. 130 students from Mogilev and Mogilev oblast gathered in business–centre Atrium in order to discuss topical issues in the area of inclusivity and offer own solutions.

Video films featuring presentations of well-known speakers dedicated to issues of people with special needs were demonstrated to the schoolers. Further on all participants were split into teams and guided by the mentors discussed potential solutions for such issues in Belarus and then presented their ideas to the audience.

The first issue elaborated by the participants was how to raise social awareness in regard to inclusivity? The ideas and solutions voiced by the schoolers included declaration of a year of inclusivity, creation of cartoons and filmmaking featuring disabled people as main characters. One of the key thoughts delivered throughout the creathon was talking to little kids and explaining them how important it is to create a cozy environment for all social groups.

The second point debated by the participants was what can be upgraded in the urban lifestyle to make it more comfortable and friendly for all dwellers? The schoolers proposed to start up a café staffed with people speaking a sign language and add description of the menu in Braille script. Besides, senior schoolers raised their voice for studying a sign language at school starting from lower grades. In youth’s opinion, it makes sense to design a special waste band for people with specific types of allergy.

Creathon was held in a creative atmosphere with a big number of interactive tasks. Teenagers with special needs participated in it too. In order to demonstrate that people with special needs are capable to realize own projects and actively participate in social life, a project named Inclusive Barista was presented at the creathon: the venue hosted a mobile café run by wheelchair users.

All ideas proposed by the senior schoolers were assessed by experts, representatives of A1 and academic community. Experts such as Anna Ivanova, a silver winner of European Championship in wheelchair dancing, Ekaterina Shulakovskaya, psychologist of Family inclusive theatre “i”, Alexander Avdevich, owner of numerous inclusive projects were focused on creativity and novelty, singularity and non-standard solutions for the points raised, feasibility of the concept and implementation capacity as well as effectiveness of the presentation.

Teams that offered the most effective and interesting ideas received gifts and all speakers – useful tips from the experts. In the end, the jury selected the best speaker of the event, i.e. Pavel Ananich, 11-grade student from Mogilev.

Regional creathons is a part of educational program The First realized by A1 under support of TEDxMinsk conference organizers. The first creathon took place in Vitebsk and appeared to be one of the brightest events in the life of the capital of the North. Similar creathons will take place on 15 February in Grodno (The First Ideas: Technologies) and on 29 February in Gomel (The First Ideas: Ecology). New episodes of the podcasts The First talking about activities in the area of technologies and ecology will be released for every event.

The First is a national contest of ideas worth spreading to make the world a better place, to change the society and life of people to the better. Applications are still being accepted and 9, 10, 11 grade students from all over the country can submit their ideas until 8 March. Every contest participant throughout the school year is engineering own idea while ten students will be selected for participation in the finals. Everyone of them will be awarded with iPhone Xs and with a guidance of an own mentor will present own idea at the large scale youth conference TEDxYouth@Minsk. For more details please visit The First www.generation.A1.by.