Tinkering towards a brighter future

Manishka Dubey is known for having won The Inventor Challenge connected Colors Infinity TV, for her ‘Child Safety Band’, a instauration that was made to assistance children erstwhile they get mislaid and can’t find their parents. Her large passionateness towards STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) and beardown tendency to assistance others person led her to marque unthinkable achievements done her years of tinkering. 

Origin of interest

Manishka’s passionateness for exertion and subject began erstwhile she was 5 and a fractional years old. This passionateness roseate wrong the walls of her schoolroom erstwhile the people was being taught a section astir abstraction and the ISS (International Space Station). Her involvement further grew with a abbreviated travel to the school’s theatre room, wherever their teachers showed them precisely what went connected wrong the ISS, and the enactment the astronauts did there, which chiefly includes spending six-month expeditions wherever they support the abstraction presumption and behaviour technological experiments. Following this, Manishka developed her involvement successful technology, coding, and astir importantly, robotics, which is considered to beryllium a almighty root of hands-on learning that provides students with some intelligence and motivation lessons. “When I started moving successful robotics,” Manishka recalled, successful an online interrogation with The Hindu In School, “one of the astir important lessons I learnt was, ‘resilience matters’. Every nonaccomplishment is not a setback, but a stepping chromatic that brings you person to success.” The almighty information down these words cannot beryllium overlooked. She besides emphasised the value of imaginativeness and collaboration, placing ‘teamwork’ arsenic the main constituent of focus, stating that it brought successful divers perspectives, which, successful turn, led to stronger innovative solutions. 

The smaller problems

In bid to make thing innovative, 1 of the main tools 1 would request would beryllium a blueprint oregon a displayed ocular of what their invention would look similar and what its main components would be. But earlier each this, a basal thought indispensable beryllium formed. When asked for the inspiration and process down her inventions, Manishka revealed that a bulk of her ideas came from real-life problems she noticed astir her. There are times erstwhile attraction to tiny challenges tin pb to large-scale solutions, but radical thin to place these problems owed to their size. “One happening I believe,” Manishka stated, “is that tons of radical enactment connected bigger problems, but they don’t absorption connected the tiny problems that hap astir one’s location oregon neighbourhood.” Once she took announcement of these kinds of problems, a antithetic question took signifier successful Manishka’s mind: “Can I solve these problems with technology?” That is erstwhile the process began! Every clip a agleam thought clicked successful her mind, Manishka would sketch, physique models, and make elemental simulations to visualise it. In her words, “Innovation is astir connecting curiosity with problem-solving,” and past bringing astir a caller experience.

The tinkering process

The quality of tinkering and inventing comes from the information that it tin crook creations that erstwhile laic wrong the virtual, intangible realm of thoughts and ideas into objects of reality. But however does 1 crook an thought into a real-life creation? “What I do,” Manishka revealed, “is fundamentally prime a problem, and ideate antithetic scenarios. What tin happen? What cannot? What should I add, and what shouldn’t I?” It is done asking this bid of questions that the young techie decides the components required to crook her genius thought into a moving invention. Once the parts are chosen, the adjacent measurement is to scribble! To really visualise her invention, and marque it look bully and catchy, Manishka draws a basal sketch of its structure. “The blueprint comes to my caput during the step-by-step process of identifying the occupation and coming up with a solution to it.” 

But the drafting process isn’t ever easy. Unlike paintings and mean sketches, blueprints clasp drawings of objects that request to beryllium replicated and utilized successful existent life. When Manishka began creating basal sketches of her devices, determination was ever disorder that arose regarding their design. This included their shape, size, components, features, space, etc. But she ever had her mentors to assistance and usher her done these doubts and confusions. Her hunt for solutions to tiny problems and originative inventions led her to the signifier connected Colors Infinity TV successful 2022, wherever she won The Inventor Challenge. And it was present that she revealed her adjacent large measurement for her travel arsenic a changemaking inventor/techie.

Support successful STEM

When she was connected The Inventor Challenge, Manishka was asked a large question, “What volition you bash further?”. Her reply came successful the signifier of Tinker Techie, an innovative startup that she founded to supply solutions and enactment to child-centric and acquisition problems faced successful the satellite today, and besides supply girls with acquisition to get into STEM.

In a survey precocious conducted connected 942 students by NGO Child Rights and You (CRY), it was revealed that a large hurdle for young girls funny successful STEM-related careers was their deficiency of consciousness astir the fields, with 52% of them not knowing what STEM stood for, contempt 54% of them readying to instrumentality up subject arsenic their main watercourse of study. A information of the young girls who wanted to prosecute STEM acquisition faced a deficiency of household enactment successful the signifier of accepted expectations and aboriginal matrimony arrangements. 

Providing girls with consciousness of STEM, support, and a bully relation exemplary tin service arsenic a large measurement towards helping them summation amended entree to the fields. Manishka strives to beryllium 1 of these relation models. “I judge that if I tin bash it, immoderate miss can!” she stated, “Tech has nary gender, STEM has nary gender. Everybody has the adjacent close and accidental to beryllium successful the tract of subject and technology.” Workshops are conducted, and communities are created and managed. “We connection intra-community enactment for girls who are facing immoderate issues successful the tract of STEM, careless of property oregon location.” These workshops are held some online and offline for the comfortableness of those who unrecorded acold away.

Challenges faced

Manishka’s way to the founding of her startup was a bumpy one, with galore obstacles. One of the biggest hurdles she had to look was her age. When she was eight, she was fixed enactment by iStart Rajasthan, a flagship inaugural that provided platforms and promotions for students to make startups. Supported by her iStart advisor Raunak Singhvi and her robotics and coding mentor Shailendra Tripathi, Manishka was provided with the cognition and skills she needed to participate the startup world. “When I started my startup, I was truly new,” Manishka revealed. “I didn’t cognize thing astir the startup world, however to pitch, oregon grasp the attraction of investors. But erstwhile I got into iStart, I got to spot different startup founders doing it and got motivated.” Being caller to the tract of entrepreneurship, she turned her challenges into learning experiences. Manishka had to equilibrium moving her startup with her studies and schoolwork. When the unit got to her, making her consciousness demotivated and uninspired, she took clip unsocial to partake successful calming and amusive activities, similar listening to music, playing with her brother, and spending clip with the radical she loves.