The Design Sprint Summer School welcomed high school students interested in modern digital technologies and their practical application in solving defined urban problems. Mentors and experts from FIT CTU introduced the participants to the Design Sprint method, in which individual teams found out whether their idea and solution has a chance of success. Through a combination of workshops, lectures and teamwork, they were introduced how to formulate a problem correctly, how to come up with solution proposals using information technology and how to select the final solution in a team, how to create a prototype, test it and present the result to the public. The learners gained new expertise in the field of information technology, introduction to game design, computer graphics or presenting, and tried how not to fixate on their idea, but to select and create a concept from the ideas of the whole team, which everyone accepts as their own.
"I am glad for the summer school, which brings high school students from all over the country to the faculty. This year it was difficult to select only some of the participants because the interest was huge. I was pleasantly surprised by the topics the students chose and the problems they see in urban life. It's a pleasure to pass on IT knowledge and experience, to show them methods and procedures and to see what imaginative solutions they come up with after five days," says the main mentor of the Design Sprint Summer School and head of the Usability Lab at FIT CTU MSc. Ondřej Brém. "This is a credit to the entire summer school team, and especially to my fellow mentors who are dedicated to the students all week long," adds Ondřej Brém.
The first team dealt with the lack of greenery in Prague's streets, especially where conventional planting of trees or other greenery is not possible. As a solution, they proposed a game that would motivate local residents and other citizens to plant and take care of greenery on the streets. The second team came up with an idea to show residents interesting places in their neighbourhood. The app that the students designed engages citizens by gamifying the interesting places in their homes to take pictures and share them with others. They have a personalised avatar in their profile for which they can buy accessories (clothes or accessories) in exchange for rewards for sharing photos and information.
A third team come up with their idea being motivated by more than 3,000 car-pedestrian collisions last year. The most common reason is crossing at red lights and avoiding overpasses and underpasses. Their solution is provided by an app that selects the optimal safe and smooth route. The app's audio alerts for route changes and points of interest on the way eliminate the need to constantly monitor your mobile phone.
Why don't Prague residents cycle to work more often? As the fourth team found out, the primary reason is safety and the secondary reason is bike storage. The team suggested safe separation of bike lanes and expanded bike storage.
Filing tax returns is a pain and weak point of bureaucracy. Filing the form is lengthy and incomprehensible. The fifth team proposed a web-based interface where electronic filing would take a few minutes with automatic completion of information on the citizen the state already possess. The website also includes a virtual assistant service that uses artificial intelligence, as well as a calculator that will continuously show the amount of taxes.
The sixth team designed a web portal so that citizens would not have to go to different offices and could find out and solve everything in one place. Queries can be directed to a chatbot that uses artificial intelligence or by using a form directly to the official. The portal is enhanced with a special Location feature that, once launched, updates information relevant to the place of residence or business.