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1. Description of Our Community
Our community, Karachi is the commercial and financial capital of Pakistan. Most of the people are multilingual speaking atleast 3 languages. The most common languages are Urdu, English and Sindhi. It is located in the province of Sindh and has one of the biggest ports of the region. The people of Karachi enjoy life through shopping, eating out and going to the beach.
2. Summary of Our Project
Our project explores the violation of Animal Rights and its consequences. We are a group of students in Karachi and thus, have limited our research to the city of Karachi. The reason for this was to remain focused to one area, so that a tailor-made solution could be developed. All the research conducted for this project is through fieldwork, local newspapers, the internet and interviewing locals.
Our final solution is a feasibility report for a Zoo in Karachi, which would be responsible for preserving animal rights and parallel to that, will prove to be a learning experience for the youth in Karachi. This report is being presented to the government of Pakistan or to any private company interested in investing in the business. It includes an introduction to the zoo we want to set up, along with a marketing and financial plan to work it out.
3. Our Computer and Internet Access
A. Percentage of students using the Internet at home:more than 50%
B. Number of workstations with Internet access in the classroom:more than 6
C. Connection speed used in the classroom:dedicated connection
D. Number of years our classroom has been connected to the Internet:more than 6
4. Problems We Had To Overcome
We faced a number of problems in completing the project. First, the conditions of the city were not such that we would be allowed to go to the Karachi Zoo. It is a place where you can expect murders to happen and only then a body had been found outside it.
We decided to go with our parents and took our teacher along.
The second problem we faced, and probably the most troublesome, that we had to do the project along with our curriculum so we had hardly any time in school. Our teacher took out a solution that we used to meet online and tasks were assigned and submitted online after school.
5. Our Project Sound Bite
Participating in this project was the greatest experience we've had. The pressure, the demands and the desire to make it perfect kept us awake most nights.
6. How did your activities and research for this CyberFair Project support standards, required coursework and curriculum standards?
It all started as a school project. We are a project based learning school and our topics included Ecosystems in Geography, Living things in Science, Persuasion in English and Statistics in Mathematics.
Our teacher made a project on 'Rebuilding the Karachi Zoo'. Where we were to study different animal biomes and then visit the Karachi Zoo to see if the animals were provided what they should be.
Our ending task was supposed to be a report on the zoo and a detailed analysis. However, we got carried away and developed a website with our findings.
We learnt how to work in groups, sort issues, solve problems. Our teacher calls them 'real life skills'. We also learnt the real life application of using averages (after we got the questionnaires filled by people)
After the completion of the project, we were so aware of biomes and biodiversity issues that our end of year assessment paper was a piece of cake for us.
I feel if we hadn't have had internet, we would not have been able to complete the work on time as we had no time in school to do it and its not feasible to go to eachother's houses so often.
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