Entries from 10 schools and eight colleges were selected for the annual Wipro earthian awards for 2019, which were presented on Saturday. This was the ninth edition of the event, organised by Wipro Ltd., which recognises excellence in sustainability within the education process in schools and colleges in the country.
Anurag Behar, chief sustainability officer, Wipro, said the programme brings together the themes of sustainability and education in meaningful ways. “The programme helps stimulate curiosity and interest in young minds in critical areas of sustainability. This edition involved an outreach to schools and colleges across 29 States and three Union Territories, including remote locations such as Ladakh, Sunderbans, Majuli island, Little Rann of Kutch, and the Nicobar Islands,” he said.
According to a release, the 2019 edition of ‘Wipro earthian’ received over 1,300 project entries. The winning entries were selected by an independent jury.
The teams selected from schools had to demonstrate their understanding of biodiversity, waste and water through a combination of activity-based learning programmes and essays. The college teams had to submit entries on the themes of water, waste and agriculture in the urban sustainability context.
Shreya Krishnan, a class 8 student of Kautilya Vidyalaya, Mysuru, was one of the winners of the theme of waste. “We worked with pourakarmikas in Mysuru and various agencies and NGOs working on waste management, and helped create awareness about segregation at source and the ban on using plastic. Based on the experience, I can say that there needs to be a change in people’s behaviour to reduce and reuse waste,” she said.
Navya Shree Vedachala of BMS College of Engineering, one of the winners in the college category on the theme of water, worked on water conservation at Rainbow Drive Layout in Bengaluru. “One of the most interesting aspects was the emphasis on methodical steps the residents of the layout took instead of a single overwhelming project. The human touch they bought to the project enabled them to look at water crisis as an opportunity to come together instead of a cause for paralysis,” she said.
