As of now, the Bike Sharing Proposal on Occidental's campus is pretty much finalized and ready to be submitted for approval. As the semester comes to an end, the alternative transportation group has gone as far as it was able with the time allowed. As a member of the alternative transportation group and being part of the creation of this proposal from the beginning, I believe I can represent my group with feelings of concern for the future of our hard work and efforts. Since none of us will be apart of the class next semester, not to mention a handful of us being abroad or distracted by a new class load, I know we will not be working as closely with this project as we have for the past few months. So the question is, how do we keep the momentum going with this project and who do we pass it on to?
We can probably guess that there will be another alternative transportation group in this class next semester. Will they be interested in continuing on with our proposal? Will they be required to? If so, will they be able to work off from our proposal without any of our research knowledge/knowledge we have required from meetings we attended? How will a completely new group's take on our proposal effect the bike sharing program at Occidental? The key to the success of the program actually happening is how we pass on our project to the new group taking on the responsibility.
I'm sure we will all be more than happy to pass on our information to be contacts for the new group should they have any questions, but if they need further assistance if we are too busy or abroad for example, I think it would be a good idea to have an original person involved with the program who will would be willing to attend their meetings upon their request/be a supervisor. Professor Vallianatos could probably answer and guide most of the group but for some reason if there is some confusion within the proposal, one of us would need to explain.
Another idea is that should they need to meet with anyone else again (e.g. library staff) one of us could go with them for the first meeting to introduce everyone and guide the meeting. We could pass on contacts with people at the Bike Oven etc. since most of their efforts in the program will be to get the bikes in proper condition to be used. Since it is not listed, we should also put together a suggestions list for next steps such as advertisement, passing on our website to them and urging them to meet with tech to make it a possible link to the library, making the safety video we sadly never got to make, finding a student worker, list of contacts we have created during the semester etc. Here are just a few ideas to ensure the successful future of the bike sharing program at Oxy and I'm sure I'm missing A LOT so please leave feedback and suggestions!!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I definitely agree with your concerns. Rebecca Dowling has stressed to us several times in meetings with her of how important it is to have younger students play a central role in the planning process to ensure future implementation and growth. The two other major bike-share program proposals in the past were developed by seniors, who were unable to see their projects through before graduation and left no one behind to carry the idea forward. It should be the transportation group's (as well as the other groups' for their own projects) responsibility to make sure their efforts and learning curve don't need to be repeated again by next semester's class. Otherwise, nothing concrete will ever get done; every semester each class would put in a lot of work and get really close to finally implementing something but then realize it is the end of the semester already. I agree with Chloe's idea of making sure next semester's class will get our materials and contacts and that, if available, we can sit in on meetings or help make suggestions for the project going forward (seeing that our names are on the proposal...).
ReplyDelete