For quite some years, our school has been working on projects beneficial for society. All the students and teachers have been divided into groups in order to carry on this message by serving through various activities. Each group has a boy and a girl in-charge, and a teacher in-charge. We have taken a great leap forward in organic farming. Our school has already received the 3rd position at the District level for “Best School in Agriculture”. For the last couple of years, our school has been providing articles like stationeries, kitchen appliances, dress materials, projector, etc. to Balikasadanam, Balasadanam, Pratheeksha Bhavan (for mentally challenged students) and 2 colonies according to their needs. We have participated in various Agriculture melas, wherein we sell products like school grown vegetables, vegetable seeds, handicrafts made by us, pickles made at school, etc. The money thus received is used for helping the needy. We also have a “Karunyapetti” in each class, where students deposit extra money that they have saved. We also have an Amrita Nidhi box at our Donation Corner. Money collected through Karunyapetti is deposited in the Amrita Nidhi box. The Donation Corner is a place where anyone who feels like helping the poor can donate clothes, rice, stationeries, etc. The Donation Corner has separate boxes for clothes, stationary items, grains, etc. for orphanages and colonies. As part of implementing organic farming, student groups have visited neighbours, the town, etc. and distributed seeds. Our school has been given A+ grade by the Malayala Manorama Nalla Padam Project.
The activities undertaken by Amritam for this academic year are:
- Pidiyari: The main objective of this is to provide rice and grains to the poor and needy. Every Thursday, certain classes take the responsibility of bringing a handful of rice, and the rice thus collected is then passed on to orphanages. We have already started this activity on October 29th with the contributions from students of classes 9 and 10. The collected items will be handed over to the inmates of Balamandir, Mattannur, Balikasadanam, Kannur and Balasadanam, Mattannur.We have also decided to donate stationeries to Balasadanam, Balikasadanam and colonies for around 125 people every month.
- Interview: The objective of this is to meet with ordinary people and the needy, listen to their problems and suffering, and learn about that face of life from them. The group will also interview rich and famous people in our locality in order to learn about the other face of life
- Survey: The information collected by the interviewing group will be passed on to all the groups as a case study to work on. The survey group will be focusing on people who are suffering to meet their daily needs.
- Sealing of Desires: Based on the case study done by the survey group, a team of students will find resources to sort out the issues. The plan is to provide medical support by sacrificing their desire to buy junk food. Helping a paralysed parent (we donated nearly Rs. 1 lakh last year for his treatment) is just one example of our move towards helping the needy.
- Visiting Orphanages and Colonies: The aim of this is to visit orphanages and colonies, and distribute food and dress materials to the residents. We plan to visit the women of the colonies twice a month under our Women Empowerment programme in order to train them in vocational projects like soap making, phenoil making, etc., and to help them learn mushroom farming. All the raw materials for this will be provided by the school. Providing vocational training in craft making is yet another endeavour of this group. The finished products will be sold at the Amrita Stall at our school and the money will be handed over to the women of these colonies.
- Bird feeding: We will spend 20 minutes every Thursday to feed birds. Teachers will train us in making feeding baskets and nests using coconut shells and natural materials. Awareness classes to bring students closer to nature will be handled by this group.Class I-V – Pencil drawing competition (Topic: – Bird)VI-VII – Quiz (Topic: – Nature and Bird)VIII-IX – Training session to make productive and useful materials from waste materialsX – XII – Collect articles related to birds
- Making cloth bags: This group plans to stitch cloth bags using old clothes brought by students and teachers. These cloth bags will be distributed to nearby localities, thus creating awareness against the use of plastic bags. Messages pertaining to saving nature and avoiding plastics will be written on the cloth bags. A schedule has been made for stitching and distributing the bags.
- Birthday gifts to parents and staff: As a mark of respect and gratitude towards parents and staff, students will be giving them gifts and greeting cards on their birthdays. This activity will help students to build closer bonds with their parents and school.
- Chanting Bhajans: Students are divided into groups with the objective of chanting bhajans at temples on special days, thus creating awareness about the Paramatman who dwells within each one of us. On a monthly basis, our students will be visiting orphanages and old age homes and providing classes to the inmates on meditation, yoga, chanting, bhajans, etc.
Amritam Project – Pidiyari
Amritam Project – Interview
Amritam Project – Sealing of Desires
Amritam Project – Visiting Orphanages
Amritam Project – Visiting Colonies
Amritam Project – Bird Feeding
Amritam Project – Making Cloth Bags
Amritam Project – Birthday gifts to parents and staff
