A city school organised a day-long inter-school fest on climate change on Thursday.
The fest was based on Amitav Ghosh’s book The Living Mountain, which the author himself described as “parable about climate change”.
Mahadevi Birla World Academy had asked its students participating in the fest to read the book. Various workshops over a period of time culminated in the fest for middle school students on Thursday.
The events that were part of the inter-school fest — Spardha 2022 — included debate, dance, fashion-show and art exhibition.
All the events centred around climate change.
Ghosh, the author, called for action while addressing students virtually over a video message. “...this is an issue that is not going to go away. We cannot ignore it... I am very happy to know that Mahadevi Birla World Academy has taken up the issue and is recommending that students read my little story. But you have to take many more steps after that,” was the author’s message that was screened during the inaugural ceremony.
Anjana Saha, the principal of the school, said that the overarching theme of the festival was “care for climate”. The school selected The Living Mountain, because it was “short and topical”.
Not only did the book help the kids know more about the impacts of climate change, but it also enhanced their reading skills that have suffered a lot during the pandemic years, said the principal. “In the last two years of online lessons, reading periods or conversation classes where books are discussed had suffered and this helped us to reinforce reading initiatives,” said Saha.
But as Ghosh called for action, the school also plans to take the initiative forward and not end it in a day-long fest.
Activities in everyday schooling are also centred around caring for the environment to help children think about the problem and try to minimise the onslaught on nature.
A student of Class VII of the school said that a change “I, for example, try not to use plastic items. Even when my parents go to the market I tell them to carry jute or cloth bags,” said Adishri Agarwal.
“We have collected 1,000kg of waste (electronic and paper) that would be handed over to an organisation. Simultaneously, we have initiated a project where every week certificates are given for clean classrooms,” said Saha. “But a class loses points despite being clean if the lights or fans are not switched off,” added Saha.
During the festival, the students brought to the fore issues like random use of plastic and the onslaught on nature.
“Climate change is the biggest problem that humanity has ever faced. It’s the younger generation, people like you who are in school now, who will have to deal with this problem in future,” said Ghosh.
He said that one of the most encouraging things that he sees in the world around us is that “young people are rising to the challenge, they are taking this problem more and more seriously.”
A group of Class VIII students made an installation of a mountain. “We tried to show how humanity is destroying mountains,” said Class VIII student Yashica Jain.