COMMUNITY SERVICE INITIATIVE

COMMUNITY SERVICE INITIATIVE (CSI)

Main Task: The community-based services in CSI module for SABD are to expose students to the real community living in the real life situation. The students are to work together as a team for architectural, culture and environmental enhancing activities in the communities of different socio-economic status and social groups. The series of community services are offered under four (4) categories/themes and as student empowerment projects they are given the freedom to choose and to execute the project In the best possible manner (term and condition applied and must within the constraint of the project requirements).

Beneficiaries Selection: My group has chosen DiverseCity as our project category and the site is at Sri Tioman 1, Taman Melawati.

PROJECT 1 : E-JOURNAL

WEEK ONE

The intention of Community Service Inititative (CSI) module is to reveal students to the real community and work as a team of architectural, culture and environmental enhancing activities in the community background of different social economic status and social groups. By using our knowledge - what we have learnt throughout the semesters, we are required to solve the real life problem by understanding the needs of community more in depth in order to ensure a workable and functional design. In group of 8, me, Rudy, Juergen, Arron, Soon, Su Ling, Peidi and Pui Yan are having opportunity to work with each other. We are given 4 options to choose from, either Charitable Homes or Organization (CH), Community Center (CC), Street Community (SS) or DiverseCity Project. The objective to be achieved for each beneficiary varies. After a short discussion, we opt for DiverseCity Project instead, as it is a scheduled project.

About DiverseCity Project: We are introduced to this DiverseCity project by Mr. Huat Lim, the director of ZLG Design. It is a totally new beneficiary for this CSI module. I personally find it challenging because the purpose of this project is to improve the living quality of the low-privileged community as well as to bring back that spirit of community within the given site, Perumahan Awam Sri Tioman 1 in Taman Melawati. It is definitely not simple to achieve these objectives because we have zero experience on doing things like this, and it is definitely different from design studio. We always say that we pay attention to the user's needs while we design, but this time, it is going to be real. And what more important, it is going to be showcased in KLIAF! Wow!

First Site Visit: We are given different time slots to select for our first visit to the site ever. This is to minimize noise effect caused to the residents over there. We spend about 40 minutes to reach the site, taking photos while we are wandering about the spaces. To me, the site is relatively well-maintained. You get to see a void or a community sharing space at the center between two blocks. That space caters the need for residents from different age groups: playground for kids, futsall court for young people, a community center for everyone. I also felt surprised by the good condition of the flat, especially when we are in a heavily modernized urban city.

WEEK TWO

We are informed to have our second site visit to obtain and collect data as well as relevant information for our upcoming consideration of design proposal. We work separately according to the topic we have chosen from the list:

Greening
Mural painting (our group selection)
Playground
Way-finding

With all the measuring equipment ready, we measure the size of possible walls that can be used for mural painting. All these measurements also eventually aid us in creating the overall site plan using AutoCAD.

Community Engagement: Apart from data collection, we also have a close engagement with the younger community of the site. DiverseCity has prepared a big piece of site plan for them to draw on whatever they wish to have over there. We play with the kids and ask them to bring their friends over to draw on the plan. Most of the kids draw on mainly animals, flowers, and some exciting games like skytrex. In the evening, we also painted a pegboard for the site plan to be pinned up. Honestly, it is really an eye-opening experience for me because you wouldn't know what the kids think for what they want, and the most shocking thing is, they even know they need to bear the responsibility to take care of it! My first time painting is another achievement unlocked. Feeling really good, especially when I can do something return to the community while escaping from the stress in study.

WEEK THREE

We have our first group meeting to discuss and propose about what to contribute to the community staying at Sri Tioman 1. Looking back at all the photos that we have taken during our visit, we plan to beautify the gazebo since it is abandoned, disused by the community and not fully utilized. It is located between two blocks of the flats, near the futsal court. During our visit, we found out that there were teenagers hanging out there, with minor vandalism issues that happened on the gazebo. Children also rested there after their futsal sports. However, there is lacking of maintenance for the gazebo.

Highlighted location of gazebo:

Issues Found on Gazebo:

About Proposal: We feel that the gazebo has a great potential to be beautified for more users to have more different purposes. In order to solve these issues, we refer to some online references and decide to:

plant louvred climbers around the gazebo to create a second screen-shading purpose, extending from roof to the ground to make the gazebo look nicer.
repaint the wall with murals to make it more attractive.
place signage to catch attention of the residents to encourage them to gather over here to have a talk or a rest in the evening.
replace broken seat tiles with polished concrete seats to lessen the maintenance needed.
fix the broken part of the drainage to allow the smooth flow of rainwater from the gazebo to the main drainage.
replace the missing roof tiles with new ones to prevent rainwater from dropping into the space.

Later on, we start to delegate the task to prepare the required presentation slide about our proposal of beautifying the gazebo.

Design Sketches:

WEEK FOUR AND FIVE

We have our first tutorial with Ms. Ann regarding the presentation slides that we have done. Comments are given:

We should understand the needs of the residents before making decision.
Interviews should be conducted to understand what they really want.

We realized that the proposal is not just about applying architectural knowledge to solve the problem on site, but mainly to make a respond to the community needs. Therefore, we decide to visit the site again to make interviews with the locals and collect opinions from them regarding the design that we have proposed - beautifying gazebo.

Interview Outcome: Since the main users of the gazebo are high school teenagers, we scope down our survey interviewees to young people. The comments received are positive because they usually spend time there with their friends. They seem to be interested in beautifying the gazebo as they hope to increase the comfortability of the gazebo. Besides that, we also interviewed the neighborhood chief (or ketua kejiranan) for his opinion. He hope that we are able to come out with a simple design rather than a striking one as it just serves the intention to attract people. He also hope that the gazebo can be a place for the neighborhood community to gather there under the shed when they are free. By summarizing all data we have collected, it can be concluded that the residents hope for a better change on the current condition of the gazebo.

Final Proposal:

WEEK SIX, SEVEN AND EIGHT

We attend a meeting at PPR office to meet the staffs from ZLG Design regarding the timeline of proposal submission, feedback session, and the work frame throughout the upcoming month. The following keynotes have been recorded:

Week 7 (7th May - 13th May 2018): Submit idea
Week 8 (14th May- 20th May 2018): Refine idea
Week 9 (21st May - 27th May 2018): Present to PPR

We submit our final proposal to both Ms. Ann and Mr. Huat Lim. Unfortunately, our proposal does not manage to be accepted. The given comments immediately within one week are:

The task scope involved in the proposal is more likely a major construction project, hardly be done by students.
Suggested approach can be climbers screen as sun shading device - which is workable for students to prepare and construct.