Marking the number of trees on the school campus may not, by itself, sound an altogether thrilling assignment for a student. But in the five schools where the project has been carried out, the few hours spent in the Sun studying the flora on their campus were a lively session for students.
These interactive gatherings of students and teachers of five government schools were carried out as part of their eco-club activities, an initiative of Tree Walk. The data would soon be compiled as booklets of information on the trees on the campus.
In addition to listing the species of trees and shrubs, students were tasked to find out more about their properties, whether they yielded fruits and note down any snippets of traditional knowledge about them.
Booklets These booklets will include details on the local and scientific names of the trees, very similar to the ‘Tree Registers’ that the organisation ‘Friends of Trees’ publishes every year on World Environment Day.
Since this documentation is being done by and for students, it will also include photographs and illustrations highlighting the importance of conserving the local environment.
Tree Walk has been organising for the past two years programmes that invite city residents to learn more about trees in public areas or campuses, but this time it is the students themselves who are leading the efforts to document their immediate environment.
“This is important as it makes them more aware of conservation efforts,” said Tree Walk coordinator S. Anitha. It was first carried out at the Attakulangara Government Central High School following fears that a large part of the lush campus would be taken over to build a bus terminal and shopping complex. The other schools include Pettah Vocational Higher Secondary School, Pettah Boys’ Higher Secondary School, Jagathy Government High School and Model Boys’ Higher Secondary School.
The registers will, most likely, be separate booklets with one on each campus.
Repository What these schools have done is the basic idea behind the People’s Biodiversity Registers of the Kerala State Biodiversity Board, which seeks to encourage the local people in spearheading conservation efforts. It is the local bodies that have to take the initiative to carry out surveys to build a repository of natural resources, but the Thiruvananthapuram Corporation only recently decided to appoint two persons to coordinate the project.
