These unique initiatives by schools and colleges in India are saving the environment

During last week’s Mann Ki Baat broadcast, Prime Minister Narendra Modi praised the efforts of the students of St. Teresa’s College in Kochi, Kerala, for their unique use of sustainable and upcycled material to make toys for children in Anganwadis in the state. He said the initiative provides underprivileged children with quality toys, solving the waste problem. 

With over four crore tons of unprocessed waste getting dumped in landfills across India every year, there is an urgent need to find ways to repurpose, recycle, and upcycle them. Several educational institutions in India have taken the initiative to change the way we reuse waste.

Here are some of the remarkable work these institutes are doing:

Akshar School

Akshar School students in Assam come from families that collect waste from landfills to sell as scrap. Some of the plastics collected are burned to keep the family warm in the winter. However, the fumes from the fire fill the classrooms at the school run by Parmita Sarma and Mazin Mukhtar.

That’s when the duo decided to ask the students, especially those who could not afford the fees, to bring in plastic waste to recycle instead of fees. The tuition fees are equivalent to 25 pieces of plastic waste, which can be recycled into eco-bricks at the school itself.  

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Lingchom Secondary School

While Sikkim is known for its cleanliness, the students of Lingchom Secondary School in Sikkim were unhappy with the plastic bottles around their school. Guided by their Headmaster Rajesh Kumar Thapa, the students initiated a waste recycling programme.

These students form teams with specific areas allotted to each. They undertake door-to-door-collection, searching through garbage for plastic bottles, cardboard waste, and other discarded items to repurpose.

In fact, these students visit nearby villages twice a week or sometimes more to bring the trash collected to the school, where they employ innovative approaches to make useful items.

Sukhdev College

Students at Delhi University's Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business Studies redefined how waste paper can be used. As part of a unique initiative, they collected paper that was used on one side and discarded later by corporate houses and educational institutions.

They employed women from poor communities to bind these discarded papers into notebooks, distributed at low-income schools or sent to colleges and schools to be reused. This project provided much-needed employment for marginalised communities and also minimised wastage.

Vidyashilp Academy

Vidyashilp Academy — a private school in Bengaluru — set up a paper recycling unit on its campus in 2012, which processes over 35 kg of paper and scrap that’s collected daily in large trash bins placed across the campus.

The students create jewellery boxes, corporate sets, diaries, envelopes, and gift bags from the recycled papers to distribute at the Government High School in Begur. Besides, the majority of the school’s need for paper, including the newsletter, report cards, etc., are made from the paper recycled from the unit. 

HMV College

As part of the “My Waste, My Responsibility” campaign — launched by Jalandhar’s Health and Sanitation Department — the students at HMV College created a recycling unit that converts waste paper into coloured sheets to make office files, greeting cards, envelopes, and decorative papers.

The unit recycles waste paper, cardboards, denim, and stationery. The recycled paper is made according to future requirements, and each sheet of paper can be recycled thrice.

The wastewater generated is used for gardening, while the whole process is free of toxic chemicals as only alum is used.