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Students to Build Portable Schools in India

The designs will aid some 18,000 children.

Mairi Beautyman -- Interior Design, 4/14/2008 12:00:00 AM

This summer, art, architecture, and design students will team up to design and build portable school shelters for children living in the slums around Mumbai, India. A collaboration between Philadelphia-based Temple University and the International Design Clinic (IDC), the initiative will include students from seven universities and six disciplines.

The IDC annually organizes humanitarian construction projects built from undervalued materials, with help from teams of students, volunteers, and humanitarian organizations. Past projects include an urban tent for the homeless made of trash and a playground for abandoned children in Romania constructed with discarded bit of concrete, rocks, and dirt.

The student designs for Mumbai will be used by local organizations to revamp over 70 centers, which serve some 18,000 children. To kick the program off, a group of students will spend the next spring semester building a rainwater collection system for a Philadelphia-based non-profit using primarily reclaimed material.

Above: Past IDC projects include an urban tent for the homeless, constructed from trash.