The Education Department is considering implementing SAVE (Student Army for Vivid Environment) in schools across the State.
Secretary of Public Education A. Shajahan was in the district on Saturday to discuss the unique educational activities being organised in Kozhikode under the aegis of SAVE and ACT (Association of Creative Teachers). SAVE has been active in schools in Kozhikode district for nearly five years, implementing various projects to ensure that students are directly involved in the upkeep of the environment.
Some programmes of SAVE include ‘Zero budget plastic waste management’, ‘Pakshikku kudineer’, ‘Jeevajalam’, ‘Mazhayatra’, and ‘Back to ink pen’.
In Zero budget waste management, students manage plastic waste at their homes. They wash, dry, and store plastic waste, which is collected at the schools once in three months and sent for recycling.
Mazhayatra is a trip down a hill enjoying the rain and the beauty of the Western Ghats.
The students maintain a pitcher full of water near their houses and schools for birds during summer under the Pakshikku kudineer programme.
Under Jeevajalam, every school selects a water source and revive it, if needed, under the aegis of the school PTA and local people and protect it thereafter. There is also a project to encourage children to use ink pens and forsake ball point pens. Nalla Vellam Nalla Pathram is a programme that encourages students to forsake plastic water bottles and adopt steel or glass bottles.
Besides, there are programmes for setting up medicinal and butterfly gardens at every school, with each class to plant and maintain a tree and maintain a groove at the school with enough land.
Some programmes of DIET (District Institute of Education and Training) and Educare project of the Kozhikode District Panchayat are also being considered to be implemented Statewide. Deputy Director of Education E.K. Suresh Kumar, environmentalist T. Shobheendran, and SAVE coordinator Vadayakkandy Narayanan handed over the project report to Mr. Shahjahan.
DIET principal D. Padmanabhan and Regional Deputy Director of Higher Secondary Education K. Gokula Krishnan, besides district coordinator of Save Public Education Committee G. Madhu were present.