1. Project description

The purpose of this project is raise awareness on plastic waste hazards by mobilize young people specially school students because a child is change catalyst who should be taught about plastic pollution and how has it affected our ecosystem from a very young age so that he/she may develop their character and practice to be empathetic and kind towards the planet as they grow older and the information of saving planet will be passing from one generation to another generation.The team has been conducting series of activities massively in local schools following the activity calendar \"Plastic Free School\\\\\\\'\\\\\\\' some of them are: workshop, plastic free school campaign, follow ups , cleaning campaign ,  students commitments to reduce plastic pollution, report writing and presentation to develop sustainable handling single use plastic to limit and control plastic pollution impacting climate starting from the formative age in house and schools as awareness through education on environment including school-level education for students, sustainable consumption behavior guidance, and pollution prevention education for the public, is the feasible, effective, and permanent resolution of plastic pollution in the future plays very important role. These activities will be conducted in circular basis in each local school.

2. Project progress up to now

ICA Nepal Environment team is a youth wing of ICA Nepal, formed having concern to address climate issues that’s growing in cascading order and realized that these issues needs to be solved. Furthermore to address the climate issues ICA Nepal Environment team started working with local schools with the support of seed grants from Korea SHE Foundation. This project is very first project for the team working with the external support.

From the month of May to July 2023, ICA Nepal Environment team has been actively working on plastic free school campaign addressing effects of single use plastics in our daily life and how badly affecting the climate through environment education and activities to the students of grade 6 to 9 from the age group of 13 to 16 years in three local and private schools.

Despite that the team is doing a monthly follow ups to the schools where the project is already implemented. In addition, some of the local schools have approached to the team with the request to conduct similar programs in their schools too therefore the team is planning to work with them in the days to come.

After the workshop on Plastic Free School, the students highlighted 5 different things that they did/ changed to promote Plastic Free Earth, the name of any 3 individuals that they shared about the workshop, and their responsibilities regarding the commitment to Plastic Free Earth, followed by listing out 3 different things that they did to minimize Plastic Earth on Individual, Family and School sector. 

The follow-up program also highlighted the Green School Guideline designed by the Ministry of Education Science and Technology, Nepal in 2018. The main working areas of green school guidelines are Eco club, Water and sanitation, Waste management, Eco-school, and Promotion of green plants. Further, the students committed to making their classroom a Plastic Free Zone in the entire July month. For Plastic Free July, the students will maintain a journal for a month where they will jot down all the things they did to prevent plastic (including any small thing) and ensure the prevention of any plastic-related materials inside the classroom.

The Workshop on Plastic Free School has empowered and aware students to minimize plastic from the root level.

3. Project plan forward

This project aims to massively aware students, teachers, community about plastic pollution through environment education particularly on plastic use that affects our climate.

Even though the topic \\\\\\\'\\\\\\\'Climate change\\\\\\\'\\\\\\\' is included in course book, students find it very difficult to understand because the resources are very limited, language barriers, course book has limited content that is not enough to give as much information as students want to get. One of the students of Class 9, Mr. Siddhant Bista stated that “Even though the topic is contented in our curriculum, it lacks enough coverage and overall scenarios; the topic is limited to one chapter which is very inadequate for us to relate and reflect”.

Despite being a global need, limited materials and resources are observed that are being focused on children and youth groups.  The inadequate information/videos/resources in our native language have made it difficult for us to reach more youths and communities. Even though there are various videos and resources available online the student groups that we are currently focusing on are primary-level students from Grades I to V, hence they are unable to acquire authentic details. Therefore, the team is planning to develop educational and interactive videos in simple Nepali language which will be easy to understand by everyone making it solely in Nepal\\\\\\\'s context. The locally based resources on our native language and materials will help us to conduct multiple activities to facilitate the schools. These videos could be easily made available on YouTube where thousands of teachers, parents, and secondary-level students can access the information to learn, share and contribute their part in saving nature for a sustainable planet.  

4. Photos