Collaboration with TXST and residents
KYLE — A local fire department is seeking community input.
The Kyle Fire Department is partnering with Claudia Röschmann and Dr. Peter Tschirhart of Texas State University to evaluate the community’s perception and develop an engagement proposal for the department through a design sprint. The event will be held from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, April 1 at Station 1, located at 201 W. Moore St. in Kyle.
“We are trying to get a gauge on the community’s perception of the fire department already. Then, we’ll kind of go from there [to] build and collaborate to get new ideas of what we can do moving forward,” said Andy Womble, community outreach specialist for Kyle FD. “We are super excited to team up with [Texas State] and see what we can all come up with together, do together and hopefully do something new at the fire department for the community.”
The key to the design sprint is to work with the community.
“This human-centered design process and the applied methodologies is to really work with the community as opposed to propose something for them. They should be a part of this,” said Röschmann, a communication design professor at Texas State.
The idea for the design sprint sparked after conversations regarding Kyle FD’s construction of a new station east of I-35, near Green Pastures.
“There were some concerns brought forward as to where the fire department sits within the community and there weren’t concerns in a negative way, rather we’re building another station in an area where there aren’t a whole lot of things happening right now and we want to make sure we are building this and fit within the community as opposed to being a stranger in this area,” Röschmann said. “We are going to task the people who are attending [the design sprint] to go through scenarios [of] feelings and emotions in order to describe where that fire department sits.”
Teams will be made up of a variation of Texas State students, community members and Kyle FD members to ensure that there are different perspectives being brought to the table.
Röschmann explained that the first step of the design sprint is to assess where the overall community sits with the department and then propose what can be done to improve.
“All of this sounds negative as if the Kyle Fire Department is in bad shape and that’s not what this is about. It’s rather a matter of whenever you are building something new and you are part of a community, especially a growing community, you want to make sure you are part of this growing community as one of the main drivers,” Röschmann said. “The Kyle Fire Department is the main driver in this new area. We want to make sure that we are bringing them closer together.”
Womble said that she hopes the event will help strengthen the relationship between the community and first responders.
“Getting to partner with these Texas State students, but then also, more importantly, the community themselves, we get all these new ideas on how we can help better serve our community. It's not just us, we can come up with ideas all day but I mean, if the community doesn't like them, then that's on us,” Womble said. “This way, we get the opportunity to work with them and see what they want so then hopefully by doing this, opening up that relationship, it'll help strengthen that relationship for the future and so on.”
Participants can be undergraduate or graduate students at Texas State or a member of the Kyle community. The deadline for registration is 5 p.m. on Friday, March 24.
Questions about the event should be directed to Claudia Röschmann at [email protected] Those interested in registering can do so at bit.ly/3Y9OfIu.
