Undergraduate and postgraduate students participating in the summer research internship programme at the Goa Institute of Management (GIM) recently attended a unique session on sustainability, circularity and responsible management practices at the institute's Sanquelim campus.
The special session for the 20 selected interns was organised by the Centre for Social Sensitivity and Action and led by the chairperson of the centre, Prof Divya Singhal, with the objective of making them aware of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); a part of a universal call-to-action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that the people across the globe enjoy peace and prosperity.
The unique and innovative session included exercises like Sewing a Button, as part of which students were given a needle, fabric and thread, and told to sew a button on a garment.
"The purpose of this hands-on experience was to remind students that in order to stop their busted shirt from being thrown in a landfill, they needed to learn to mend it. Such an effort would lead to a reduction in garbage and support the tenets of sustainability," Singhal said.
A Kahoot quiz testing the participants’ knowledge of circular economy practices and SDGs was also conducted. The first prize in the quiz competition was secured by Devansh Jaitly from Christ University, Bangalore, while Vivek Patel from Uka Tarsadia University and Eshita Kochhar from Shiv Nadar University won the second and third place respectively.
Agastya Raj from IIT Bombay and Aishwarya Sabarinath from the Manipal Academy of Higher Education (MAHE) also won prizes for their contribution in the quiz contest.
