School's ‘My Waste'drive gives kids' green goals
Government Higher Primary School
Swachha Belaku
environmental stewardship
.
A government schoolin north Bengaluru has become a beacon of change. The Higher Primary school in Kattigenehalli has taken up ainitiative like none other. Come June 5, and as many as 300 students on campus will collect dry waste from their homes and bring it to the Dry Waste Aggregation Centre set up on the school campus.The initiative, christened 'My Waste, My Responsibility', will ensure that the waste generated by the families of these 300 students does not reach landfills.'We have started this program mainly to inculcate a sense of social responsibility among our students for waste management. The initiative is catching them young and imparting the message that waste management is our duty. We are also teaching them the concepts of reduce, reuse, and recycle,' said Kalavathi S, headmistress,in Munishwara Layout, Kattigenehalli.While the school has 438 children, the initiative is being kicked off with 300 students from Class IV to Class VII.Students will soon be instructed to bring dry waste from their homes every Saturday and drop the waste into 16 segregation compartments, based on the type of waste. Once a considerable amount is collected, the waste will be picked up by a dry waste vendor and taken to certified recyclers.'The dry waste will be sold to the vendor. The aggregation centre also collects eggshells from mid-day meals. The sheels are being sent to pharmacy companies,' said Suhasini, co-founder of Vedan Trust, a non-profit organisation that is helping the school become a zero waste generating campus.Kalavathi recalls that the journey of turning the school campus into a model of dry waste management began in February last year, with the support of school teachers, Vedan Trust, and SVP India under theprogram.What began as a classroom conversation quickly became a movement, where teachers not only start to impart knowledge but also lead by example, instilling values of ownership, responsibility, andamong the students.The school underwent a plantation drive a few years ago, and over a hundred saplings were planted across the 3.11-acre campus. However, the campus soon started receiving a lot of leaf litter, forcing the headmistress and other teachers to brainstorm a solution.'Apart from dry eaves, we also had biscuit and chocolate plastic wrappers that students would discard. That was when we initiated dry waste management on our campus and established the aggregation centre.However, we have decided to take it to the next level by ensuring that dry waste generated by families of 300 students reaches the right destinations,' added Kalavathi.
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