One school will get the Parisara Mitra School Award: Director of Pilikula Regional Science Centre K.V. Rao said on Tuesday that the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB) along with the Regional Science Centre and Department of Public Instruction were encouraging 1,000 school in Udupi district to take up environment-friendly measures and activities.

Addressing presspersons here on the sidelines of an orientation programme for teachers on this initiative, Dr. Rao said that these 1,000 schools included government, aided and unaided primary and high schools. This measure of promoting environment-friendly activities in schools is already in force in 28 districts of the State. It was taken up in Udupi and Dakshina Kannada districts this year, he said.

Already orientation programmes have been held for schools teachers in Byndoor, Kundapur, Brahmavar and Karkala blocks earlier. It was held for Udupi block on Tuesday. Nearly 125 to 150 teachers had participated in these orientation programmes in each block, he said.

These schools had been given a questionnaire by the KSPC. They had to fill it and submit a self-evaluation report to the Regional Office of KSPCB by the end of December. A team of experts would go though the self-evaluation report and shortlist 30 schools. Then a team of 10 experts including student representatives would visit these schools for an on-the-spot assessment by the end of February.

Of the 30 schools, they would choose one school for the district-level Parisara Mitra School Award. This school would get a cash prize of Rs. 20,000. As many as 10 schools would be chosen as “Green Schools” and they would get a cash prize of Rs. 2,000 each, while another 10 schools would be declared as “Yellow Schools” and they would get a cash prize of Rs. 1,000. The rest of the schools would be declared as “Orange Schools” and given certificates, Dr. Rao said.

Rajashekhar Puranik, Environment Officer of KSPCB, said the schools could take up various green initiatives.

Eco-friendly: The Pilikula Regional Science Centre had given 10 acres of land to the KSPCB to develop working eco-friendly models there. The government had provided Rs. 5 crore for this project, he said.

@ @Orientation programmes have been held

@ @A team will assess these schools

Source:http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-karnataka/green-initiatives-get-a-push-in-1000-udupi-schools/article6613494.ece