Envisioning Sustainability-Focused Education with Kinetic Singapore’s School of Tomorrow
Awarded with Wood Pencil in the Campaign Branding category of the 2024 D&AD Awards, the School of Tomorrow campaign by Kinetic Singapore for Singapore Design Week 2023 organized by DesignSingapore pushed us to rethink what a sustainability-centric education system could look like. The campaign exhibition was initially unveiled on September 21, 2023 with a total of 10 subjects, and was brought back in December 2024 with an additional subject on the curriculum. Speaking with the Kinetic Singapore team, Grafis Masa Kini was able to get a closer look at the process behind the impressive School of Tomorrow.
According to Astri Nursalim, Creative Director at Kinetic Singapore, the team’s brief was to stage an exhibition for Singapore Design Week focusing on sustainability. However, they quickly understood that they would be showcasing this exhibition to an audience that has been bombarded and possibly desensitized to “go-green” messages. “We knew it would be challenging to break through. How do we combat the fatigue surrounding this topic? How do we present it in a way that is educational yet surprising and engaging? How do we share about sustainability and encourage everyone to play a part without coming across as lecturing and overbearing?” Astri began. “For a start, we knew we had to break away from conventional exhibition formats and their formal settings. We wanted to create an environment where the audience could feel at ease to explore, to learn for themselves, where the lessons are internalised rather than spoon-fed. And where better to set these lessons than in a school, albeit a school like no other! From our A, B, Cs and 1, 2, 3s to so much more, we learn everything in school. So why shouldn’t it prepare us for our greatest test — the threats and challenges of a changing planet,” she continued.
The Kinetic Singapore team was incredibly meticulous in the creation of this incredibly immersive school-going experience. Kinetic paid attention to every minute detail, from the overall design of the venue, to the settings of the exhibits, to the educational materials and props, to the ushers dressed in school uniform. “We closely referenced each subject that we co-opted for our purpose, using their familiar classroom settings to present pressing environmental issues and sustainability solutions. To make things more authentic, we also included other areas you would expect to see in a school, like the canteen, bookshop and even a sick bay. Of course, the sustainability messaging was seamlessly woven into these areas too,” Astri explained.
“Appropriately, sustainability was also key in the setup. As far as possible, we tried to rent furnishing and props, or source them from local secondhand vendors. When we had to fabricate, we chose recycled materials whenever available. We also stored whatever we could after the end of the first exhibition in the hope of giving them a second life, to reuse them should the opportunity arise, which we did when Term 2 of the school was commissioned in 2024,” she continued.
The 2023 curriculum of School of Tomorrow held at Selegie Arts Centre included 10 reimagined subjects; Art, where students can learn how to create art materials from botanical debris; Biology, reminding us of one of the most prevalent issues of our time, plastic pollution in our food chain and the available sustainable alternatives like bio-plastics; Chemistry, where the periodic table is reimagined with 45 new elements to challenge our often thoughtless use of, and dependence on, Earth’s diminishing resources; Food & Consumer Education, a canteen that dishes out meals that are not only nutritious but but also environmentally-friendly while also allowing visitors to discover unusual and overlooked sustainable foods, like algae and cricket protein, that can help food security as well as alternatives to single-use tableware and food packaging; Geography and how climate change has and will continue to transform it; Home Economics, showcasing “how fashion can be tailored to the greater good”; Mathematics, encouraging all to reexamine their individual impact with their interactive carbon footprint calculator; Physical Education, which examines the environmental impact of sports and invites students to play with sports equipment designed with sustainability in mind; Physics, illustrating how our energy and ecological demands are stretching the Earth’s resources, our model of the solar system draws on figures derived from Singapore’s Earth Overshoot Day; and Social Studies, which looks at how the study of environmental sustainability can benefit from a global perspective.
In the 2024 second term held at New Bahru creative enclave, History was added into the curriculum to put into question how we can drive sustainable progress while preserving our heritage for future generations by journeying through Singapore’s past and possible future through the lens of their historic shophouses. “We had History making up the 11th class to introduce another aspect of sustainability that receives less top-of-mind awareness: the importance of sustainable development in the face of modernisation and urbanisation,” Astri began to explain the addition. “This also dovetailed nicely with the request from our new partner (Temasek Shophouse) to feature their conservation efforts. This time around, we also had an operational bookshop, in response to the overwhelming popularity of the sustainable stationery showcased in the first exhibition. We designed a range of school-themed merchandise for sale, including stationery made from paper offcuts and plastic waste, as well as school bags made from old school uniforms contributed by the public. These were produced in collaboration with eco innovators, and 10% of the proceeds were donated to the WWF Eco-Schools Programme which supports and empowers students to become leaders of change.”
With such a thorough and immersive experience created by Kinetic, it’s no surprise that the process involved a few challenges. Intense and rigorous research was key. “One of the most challenging aspects was that we were trying to present a sustainability-focused exhibition, but we are no experts in sustainability! Before we could even start ideating, we had to do lots and lots of reading to really go deep into the many environmental issues. And to present a balanced picture, we also had to look into the many innovative solutions people all over the world are bringing to the table,” Astri explained. “This second part leads to the other challenging aspect: getting these innovators on board, co-ordinating with them, and the logistics of getting their innovations to be featured. It didn’t help that many of these innovations were still at the R&D stage, and sometimes the prototypes were not available or not allowed to be shared pending patent applications et cetera, which required us to be creative in thinking up alternative ways of presentation,” she continued.
School of Tomorrow is an excellent showcase of the role that design can play in ensuring a sustainable future and how sustainability has increasingly become a top concern in design. Executive Director of the DesignSingapore Council, Dawn Lim, stated in a press statement, “From circularity to regeneration, sustainability has become core in design, where creativity rises to meet our social responsibilities for today and the future. This is why the Council has commissioned the first edition of School of Tomorrow, which brought diverse environmental issues and innovative solutions to the fore. We are proud to support an expanded and refreshed second edition of the exhibition in the new creative enclave of New Bahru to further galvanise the community and designers to champion sustainability in their work and their lives.” For the Kinetic team, Astri explained that School of Tomorrow embodies their hope for a better tomorrow through action taken today. “Rather than a one-way dissemination of information, the creative presentation of myriad environmental issues was designed to spark conversation and reflection. On top of inspiring visitors to rethink their impact on the planet, we also hoped to nudge them towards action by sharing simple changes they can make in their daily lives to be more sustainable. We hope that visitors leave with a sense of agency, knowing that a better future is truly in their hands,” she elaborated.