Health Care and Environment Education for Underprivileged Groups in Pune
Health Care and Environment Education for Underprivileged Groups in Pune Anil and Chitra Deshpande Foundation, USA Introduction With the growing population in the unauthorized and authorized slums in Pune, it is essential to develop a locale specific Environment Education program that caters to the needs of their children. This is not to say that they need not be made aware of global issues or the wasteful ways of life of the upper economic strata but to make sure that they can see from their own way of life that good environment management of their own homes, its surrounds, and the school itself can be managed through a higher degree of environment sensitivity which would infact better their own lives. The disease patterns in their society that is prevalent due to inadequate management of their common environment and that prevalent in their waste and dumping areas, both authorized and unauthorized is an important concern. The need to reuse resources such as water, plastic, etc. that even in this resource starved area are invariably disposed off as being useless is another example of a locale specific concern that needs to be addressed. Even the small open space left between dwellings can frequently be used for planting a tree that can give shade in hot summer months. Thus, an important component of this project was aimed at connecting environmental education to several health related issues for mainly the lower economic strata of Pune which could be used to upscale the model in future. Implementation of the program A total of 20 schools were selected for this project. Of the twenty schools, nine were PMC run lower socio-economic schools from around slums, while the other eleven schools were privately managed lower socio-economic schools. However almost all the children in these 20 schools reside in and around the slums. The PMC schools are situated in the vicinity of slums in the areas of Katraj, Dhankawadi, Bibvewadi, Sahakarnagar and Wadarwadi. The privately managed schools are in the vicinity of Kothrud and Karvenagar. The program is being implemented in selected classes from 6th , 7th and 8th standards with a minimum of 50 students being involved in the program from each school. This has helped us to reach out to over 1435 students
Students attend a
lecture on ‘Biodiversity of India’
Students play a game
to understand Environmental Problems of Pune
Students are made to
understand the important relationship between health and environment
Several Community
presentations were made by the students
