Vacancy Of Environment Trainer at i-dream

Job Title: Environment Trainer – Schools
Reporting to: Head, Environment Education Division – Schools
Job Purpose Summary: To train the young generation of our country to become environmentally responsible and a smart decision maker
Key Responsibilities:
· Understand the environment education content developed by the research team at i-dream
· Deliver the content to the school children from classes VI to X in an interesting, interactive and disciplined manner
· Evaluation of students on the content taught to them
· Maintain relationship with the school authorities especially the Head Mistress and Principals
· Provide regular feedback to the research and design team at i-dream about the impact of the content on the students

Key Points to be noted:
· The work timings would be from 7:30AM to 2:00PM on weekdays
· Work timings on Saturday would be from 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM and would be reserved for internal training of the personnel and feedback by i-dream team
· The personnel would need to adhere to the dress code as prescribed by the respective school authorities

Key Requirements:
· M.Sc in Environment Science from a prestigious university. Freshers can apply. OR
· Graduate/Post Graduate in any science stream with a passion for the environment
· B.Ed is preferable but not mandatory
· Ability to work well with the school students of age group 10-16 years
· Excellent presentation, communication and public speaking skills

Why is this role important for i-dream? :
i-dream is a two year old start-up and is now gearing for the next phase of growth. Currently, we are a three member team managing all the operations in the organization. Anyone who joins us now will be the fourth pillar of the organization and hence it is extremely important for the individual to be passionate and be very sincere and disciplined towards the task at hand. The next individual who joins our start-up team will help us push for the growth and surge ahead at a brisk speed.

Location: Delhi/NCR. Few of our key schools which the personnel would manage is in North Delhi area of Shalimar Bagh

Joining Date: 23rd June, 2011.
One week will be spent on internal training and One week of on-grounds training during 1st week of July.

Remuneration: Rs. 15,000 per month during probation period of 2 months. Post which the salary would be revised up to a maximum of Rs. 20,000 per month depending on the performance of the candidate

What does i-dream offer? :
· With i-dream , you get to experience and work in a dynamic environment of a start-up company
· i-dream provides you with a platform to unleash your potential, showcase all that you have got and make an impression in this fast growing environment industry
· If you do a good job, you play a pivotal role in changing the mindsets of the young generation of India

Internship Oppotunities at i-dream

Are you a DREAMER or do you want to be one? If the answer to any of the two questions is a YES, then welcome aboard. Check the link below for internship opportunities at i-dream.

http://blog.internshala.com/2011/05/internship-with-i-dream-marketing-and-design-delhi-india/

Send us your updated resume at info@simplygreens.com.

50 Days......5000 Pledges

i-dream in association with its NGO Partner Sarthak Prayas collaborates with Centre for Environment Education and Earth Day Network for a worldwide campaign titles " A Billion Acts of Green".

You can log onto http://act.earthday.org/ for more details.

Help us reach a figure of 5,000 pledges in the next 50 days. Take it as an opportunity to either start or continue your journey towards building a better tomorrow. It only takes 2 minutes to pledge for happiness of a lifetime.

All you need to do is visit our facebook page www.facebook.com/simplygreens and leave your pledge with the following information:

My Green Pledge:

Name:

Email id:

School/College/Corporate Name:

After receiving your Pledge, we will be sending you a digital certificate.

So, get going now. Don't wait for anyone else.

Feature on Deccan Chronicle

i-dream was today featured on Deccan Chronicle edition of Bangalore and Chennai. Here's the link http://www.deccanchronicle.com/supplementary/be-your-own-boss-169.

Gujarat is showing the way. Let us atleast follow!

That India is on the verge of a serious water crisis is a foregone conclusion. So much so that the possibility of water riots in the future can't be ruled out. And it's not that the farmers of Vidarbha in Maharashtra or Bundelkhand in Uttar Pradesh are the only casualties of depleting groundwater level. In satellite townships like Gurgaon and state capitals like Hyderabad, the situation is much worse than the rest of the country. And the blame doesn't go to bad monsoons alone.

More than indifferent monsoons, this scarcity of water has been caused by over exploitation of groundwater and lack of water conservation measures at the micro level. The answer to this monumental challenge that stares at an otherwise resurgent India comes from Gujarat. The state shows the way in the form of a unique government-people partnership model for water conservation. The results are here to see.

In 2004, the water table of 112 tehsils of the total 225 tehsils in Gujarat was in semi-critical to over-exploited condition. But a satellite based survey done last year by the Central Ground Water Board (NGWB) found that as many as 60 of these 112 tehsils have regained their normal water table. What's more, the water table is rising further in many of these tehsils. Most of these tehsils are in Saurashtra and Kutch where the farmers and the government together have started a unique check dam revolution.

In the mid-90s, large parts of Saurashtra used to get water through train tankers from water-abundant areas of central and south Gujarat. Today it is a thing of the past. Earlier, many small rivers and rivulets in this region used to go dry by the end of monsoon. Now they have become almost perennial and several villages have become self-sufficient in water.

In the past 10 years, 1,05,000 check dams costing Rs 1,480 crore have been built in Gujarat under the government-people scheme. The villagers have contributed between 10 and 15 per cent of the cost in the form of labour while the Government has done the rest. Around 70,000 of these dams have been piloted by the state irrigation department and the rest by the state rural development department. These dams have a cap of Rs 15 lakh in terms of investment.

The mechanism for these check dam scheme is very simple. As and when a village committee wants to make a dam, it takes the local irrigation engineer to the selected spot. After seeing the spot, the engineer helps them select one of the six technical designs for a check dam. The six designs are finalised by the Government depending on the local geological conditions. Once that is done the department releases funds and the work on the dam begins.

The changes are less evident in north Gujarat where the topography for building check dams is not as conducive and the farmers here are also not very enthusiastic. But in this region also the water level, barring some tehsils where it is falling due to local factors, has been rising for the past two years. Says R.C. Jain, Regional Director of the cgwb and in-charge of Gujarat, "Gujarat has shown that where there is a will there is always a way. This experiment can inspire people in many water starved areas of India."

Interestingly, the check dam revolution was triggered in 1999 by Mansukh Suvagiya, a Rajkot-based social worker in Jhamka village of Junagadh where the villagers collected money and constructed 52 check dams in a span of two months on small rivulets in and around the village. Today, Jhamka is a symbol of water and agro self-sufficiency.

To get something from mother earth you have to give something back. If you don't, it will stop giving you. It's not a one-way cycle.- Narendra Modi, Chief Minister, Gujarat.

In the same year, the Saurashtra Jaldhara Trust, an NGO run by diamond magnate by Mathurbhai Savani built 213 check dams on rivulets in and around Khopala near Bhavnagar to turn the village's fortune. As the success of this experiment travelled to other areas of Saurashtra with the trust's help, the then chief minister Keshubhai Patel took interest in it and launched the ambitious Sardar Patel Water Recharging Programme in 2000 to build check dams in partnership with the people.

When Chief Minister Narendra Modi took over in 2001, he laid emphasis on creating farm ponds in areas like north and central Gujarat where building check dams was not very feasible. As a result 1,81,00,000 farm ponds have been built till date at a cost of Rs 181 crore. Farm ponds are built in that part of a farm where rain water collection happens in natural course.

In 2003, the Gujarat Government launched the Gujarat Green Revolution Company to propagate sprinkler and drip irrigation technology among farmers by giving them hefty incentives. Rated as the best in the country by the Union Agriculture Ministry for last three years, this initiative is one of the reasons why the groundwater level is getting recharged in the state.

But it was not easy for the Government to convince the farmers, who were agitating for more power, to participate in the project. The agitating farmers were told to take to water conserving farming techniques and tapping surface water through indigenous methods which could end their dependence on power. "To get something from mother earth you have to give something back. If you don't, it will stop giving you. It can't be a one-way cycle," Modi told the farmers. The agitators understood the logic of his appeal and the rest is history.

Then there are other big irrigation schemes which have helped in enhancing the water table in Gujarat. For example, in north and central Gujarat, the mud canal of the Sujalam Sufalam Yojana played a key role in bringing up the water level. The project targeted at pumping 'excess' water from the Kadana canal into north Gujarat dams by laying pipelines; building an unlined canal across 21 rivers in north Gujarat, and building two lakh farm-ponds. In another initiative, the state government has partnered with NGOs to build over 40 bigger-sized check dams costing up to Rs 1 crore.

Besides these long-term projects, certain short-term initiatives have also worked wonders. Last year, Gujarat had a bad monsoon but when the Government realised that rains could hit the state in the last leg of monsoon, it launched a quick water conservation drive by building boribunds (very small dams made by blocking small rivulets with the help of sand bags). In 20 days, over 2,50,000 boribunds came up as a result of a joint effort by the departments of rural development and forest management, NGOs and village committees.

When the rains did come, these boribunds conserved a lot of water. Says Ram Kumar, CEO of the State Watershed Management Agency: "Our resolve is to ensure that not a single drop of water is wasted." The success has not resulted in complacency in the Government which launched another innovative scheme three months ago to tap surface water on the hilly slopes of the tribal regions of south, north and east Gujarat by making terrace talavis-small ponds dug on hill slopes.

In 2009, Gujarat registered 9.06 per cent agricultural growth rate while the nation's growth rate was less than three per cent. The total cultivable area in Gujarat has increased by a phenomenal 15 per cent in the past 10 years. During that period, Gujarat's agro production has jumped from Rs 18,000 crore to Rs 49,000 crore. The state increased its cotton yield six-fold from 175 kg per hectare to 798 kg, more than the world average of 787 kg.

"Gujarat has set the finest example of groundwater management through indigenous and modern methods and through people's participation," says Tushaar Shah, senior fellow at the International Water Management Institute. When Jhamka and Khopala did it, the rest of Gujarat wondered why not they. It's time the rest of the country asked the same question.
By Uday Mahurkar

Reproduced From India Today.

Let's Do It

Delhi city produces around 8,000 MT of solid waste. If you are wondering if this is an annual figure, please hold your breath and then proceed to read the next few words : "Delhi produces 8,000 MT of solid waste DAILY". Also note that 1 MT = 1,000 kg. I do not want to even get into multuplying this figure by no. of days in a year and arriving at an annual figure, for my counting abilities are only so limited. Out of this, only 60% of the waste is collected and remaining is dumped on the Delhi roads.

However, if you are reading this, you would react in one of the following ways,

a) Oh My GOD! So much waste, we must do something about it

b) Oh My GOD! So much waste. But why should only I do something about it

c) Oh My GOD! So much waste. But even if I do my bit, how much difference is it going to make

d) Kya Farak Padta Hai yaar, kaun sa ye kooda mere ghar mein aa raha hai

If you choose 1, I can proudly say that you are amongst those few who believe in the idea of a healthy future. To them I would say, keep doing the good work friends, this is just the beginning of a journey. However, if you choose any of the remaining three options, CONGRATULATIONS because you are not alone. You are joined by millions of people across the city/country who think the same. The only thing which these people do not realize is that if all these million souls choose to think positively for the environment, their collective thoughts and the corresponding actions will reverse all the environmental impacts within a span of a few days.

Any journey however needs a captain. For the journey towards a clean city, I have certainly found one in Let's Do It Delhi initiative by Anita Bhargava and team. Lets Do It Delhi is a people's initiative and its objective is to achieve a unified action involving all the citizens of this wonderful city resulting in cleaning Delhi of its entire mess. i-dream was proud to collaborate with Lets Do It Delhi in organizing School Clean Up Day on 7 May, 2010. Students from New State Academy, Pitam Pura, Modern Public School, Shalimar Bagh were amongst the 5,000 students who participated in the campaign.

The skeptics might say how much difference it would have made to the city. It may not be much when it comes to calculating the amount of waste collected but the impact in terms of sensitizing the young generation was extremely significant. Also, through these young kids, we were able to reach out to even larger number of people with the message of Litter free Delhi.

Students from Modern Public School, Shalimar Bagh cleaning the school boundary

Students from New State Academy, Pitam Pura cleaning a local park

However, this is just the beginning. Over the period of the year 2010, Lets Do It Delhi will take this drive to even larger places in Delhi and involve more and more number of people. I urge all of you to take the Anti Litter Pledge by logging onto http://www.letsdoitdelhi.org/ and help make this city a world class city. Cmon, I am sure none of you wants to live in a filthy, stinky society. Go ahead and the MAKE THE RIGHT CHOICE.

April Fool Banaya

I dread 1 April, for every year on this day I live under the fear that someone somewhere may discover my trick through which I have been successfully fooling billions of people across the world. However, not even one intelligent soul has emerged in so many years to understand what a fool I have been making of the entire humanity.

Dull, barrena and empty thats what I am today. I am questioning my own existence nowadays and pondering that why has my beauty withered , why is my face looking pale. I no longer have my charming exuberance. The doctor says that I am suffering from dehydration. I consider myself highly unfortunate that I am unable to support even my children who can merely be mute spectators to the entire catastrophe. I wish I could once again take you in my arms and give you all the love I have my dear son. I am so sorry but I have been rendered helpless.

However, I must tell you all that I am not sitting silent. I am busy fooling the entire humanity into destruction. As they continue to trouble me and my beautiful children, I am also trying to show them how foolish they are to not understand ever what I can do to them. I am killing them slowly and therefore fooling them, for none can realize what would happen to them 20 years from now. They are all dying a slow death, their lungs, their brains, their eyes, their ears, each part of their body is slowly and gradually undergoing a change. If I would wish, I can also destroy them in a single moment. But with them, even I would cease to exist. Therefore, I am fooling them into slow death thereby also giving them a chance to redeem themselves. Only if one of them could be smart enough to understand my trick.

And I also do not need any one particular day to play tricks with humans as I play with them all year long, every day, every moment (read -floods, droughts, tsunami, cyclones etc). But on this April Fools Day, people become extra cautious and I wonder if one of them from somewhere would be smart enough to figure out my trick. Till then Happy Fools Day.

PS: I may drive some happiness by fooling the humanity but deep within I am sad and I want the humans to redeem themselves for in their happiness lies my prosperity and vice versa.
PPS: If you have still not figured out who I am, I reveal myself as Planet Earth.

with inputs from my dear friend Harshita Mittal.