pointB has team up with international design firm, frog design, to co-create a Design-Thinking Center for Community Engagement. This center aims to respond to the need in Myanmar for multi-ethnic change agents who can work with communities to facilitate linkages between civil society and the rapidly developing state and national government systems. 

In partnership with the Myanmar Ministry of Education, the Design-Thinking Center for Community Engagement is located on campus at Mawlamyine University (Myanmar’s third largest university) in Mon state.

Here’s how it works:

Multi-Ethnic Change Agents

The Design-Thinking Center for Community Engagement is specifically tailored for makers, doers + activators — people who want to lead change, tackle social issues like education and poverty, and engage local communities in Myanmar’s emerging democracy. pointB recruits multi-ethnic young adults from diverse communities and ethnic groups throughout Myanmar. These trainees live, learn and work together in an environment that promotes empathy, cross-cultural understanding and peace-building. 

The center offers a six-month, project-based course in design-thinking — a proven approach to solving social issues and challenges that focuses on empathy, collaboration, action and optimism to create new solutions for local communities. Tools and techniques from design-thinking — including frog’s Community Action Toolkit (CAT), which has been successfully piloted in Africa — teach groups of people how to organize, collaborate, and create solutions for problems impacting their community.