Inauguration of workshops
AT ST PHILOMENA’S COLLEGE
An international interdisciplinary conference on “Knowledge partnerships to advance UN sustainable development goals” started this morning in St.Philomena’s college.
Dr. Pornchai Mongkhonvanit, chair, ACD university network, president of SIAM university, Thailand and vice president, International Association of Universities, delivering the inaugural address said “sufficiency in economy of philosophy is close to my heart. Our king H.M. Bhumibol Adulyadej strove very hard to bring Thailand from 67 million poor people country to second largest economy among the ASEAN countries. Thailand received 2006 UN achievement award from the then United Nation’s General Kofi Annan for this initiative .
He continued saying Sufficiency in Economy of Philosophy (SEP) is about three pillars – Moderate, Reasonableness and Prudence. These three pillars work on two conditions i.e., Knowledge condition and virtues condition.
Dr. Pornchai said we should have co-operation over competition, togetherness over division to have knowledge over ignorance and common goals to save planet. He asked every other country to
come with living museums and living laboratories, and to turn every educational university into a university with well being of society, world and planet.
Mr. John Arul Phillip, Dean of Education and Cognitive Science, Director of Asia centre for E-learning and AE university, Kualalumpur, Malaysia, talking about ‘Technology and Change ‘ spoke about blended learning. Malaysian university uses YouTube for teaching and learning, concentrating on the concept learn, relearn and unlearn for youth. Speaking about MOOC and nano degrees, he chided that universities will not hinder the progress of technology.
This was followed by Dr. Wooday P. Krishna’s lecture. He is the chairman of Gandhi Peace Foundation and General Secretary of Seshadripuram Educational Trust. His topic was ” Sustainability and Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore”. He eulogised Gandhi for having thought of sustainability in 1909 itself. In his publication ‘Swarajya’ Gandhi had written about hazards of civilization, perspective of morality, sustainability and restraint. Though Gandhi was not against the industrialization, he had quoted “Industries are violence against people and environment. He didn’t want mass production but wanted production by mass. Speaking about the views of Rabindranath Tagore on sustainability Dr. Krishna said ” True happiness will not make us rich and happy but fullness of life will make us happy and rich”.
Bishop emeritus of Mysore Rt.Rev. Fr. Thomas Vazhapillay said our Vedas and Upanishads have dealt with environment, modernization has changed the climate, mother earth is forgotten, only hope is that there is anxiety in everybody, which may help to revert this global change.
During the occasion Royal Thai, Consul-General, Chennai Mrs. KrongKanit Rackcharoen was felicitated and she also released a book on Thailand “Chronicle of Thailand”.
The audience numbering nearly thousand consisted of Research scholars, foreign & Indian delegates , faculty members & students. After the inaugurals the speaker of the session was Mr. Jahanzeb Akhtar.
She was speaking about three categories of world. The business world is controlled by MNCs. They are smart, make millions but do not pay tax. India is a narrow tax paying country. Every year for sustainable development $2.5 trillion is required whereas $3 trillion of tax is evaded. We talk about capacity building. G20 countries talk about fair share of taxes, but at the end of the day developing countries will not have voice.
Dr. Ravikant Joshi opened his remarks on the future of the city towards sustainable & inclusive cities. “One of the best sustainable development strategies is every rupee saved is every rupee generated”. He gave lot of statistics about sustainable cities. He also discussed about monitoring systems like sustainable cities. He also discussed about monitoring systems like “Sustainable cities index, Resilient cities Report, Cities of opportunity Report, & city liveability index”.
The session was opened for interaction. The first session post lunch of Nov 17 was handled by Prof. Balakrishna Pisupathi. He started from 1992 – earth summit went on to explain various summits concerning climate change. He spoke about five key challenges- Funding, Policy, coherence, Insufficient focus on different sectors, tech transfer and capacity development.
Dr. Manju Reddy speaking about good health & wellbeing, introduced the audience to ARODHUM International changing the course of Karma – She said CARE enough to touch you, CARE enough you rise up to act, CARE enough to be the change. The third angle which she gave for half-filled glass was interesting, i,e It is not half empty, not half full, but it is fillable.
Workshop on clean Water and sanitation was held on 17/11/2017 at Room No.39 at PG block at 3.30 pm to 5.30 pm
There were 3 speakers in the session- Dr. Lawrence Surendra – chaired the session, Sri Suresh Ballal from Aqua pure , Geeta Mitra from ODP, Mysuru .
Dr Laurence Surendra in his speech stressed that none of us check the quality of water that we use daily. He asked students to check its quality for the purpose of drinking.
The second speaker Sri Sunil Ballal Explained how filters have been used to purify water in reality how it destroys waters TDS (Total Dissolve Substance) value.
The third speaker focussed on sanitation and water. She explained her work on bringing awareness and education programmes to rural people. She successfully reconstructed around 8003 sanitation toilets. She had also put forth certain questions to reflect our own life.
“Skilling, leading to some economic growth” was the topic was dealt by Ms. Sanjoita Mishra
The SDIs have been designed by the government in particular fashion the person who is getting skill is output to the process which should be based on cultural context , interest , aptitude and aspiration then the process is experimental learning.
Fr. Francis john, from Don Bosco talking about Sustainable development goals by reaching to the people through education, skill training and job placement. This is how at Don Bosco we are updating ourselves. We are looking at the education for many years then we looked into skill training and job placements. Don Bosco has a wide range of activities and development programmes enabling the youth for a brighter future and a respectable place in society.
Monisha Banerjee said out of 1.2 billion Indians only 474 million are employed, out of which 83% of people work for the unorganised sectors. Skills like time management, teamwork were said important. Hard skills can be learnt inside the job itself, so generic or transferring skills are more important and all jobs must be given importance and respect.
Fr. Stany, from Organization for Development of People said Mysore was the first district to have a self-help group in India. Lending loans to farmers with the support of the bank and help them in their growth was the main agenda.
The Conference came to an end with Valedictory programme.