PRAYAAS-VNIT:-
The idea of a contributing ones’ self to the society or in fact, repaying the society with what it has bestowed us is an urge that couldn’t be trapped within for a long time. The thought was nurtured by Mr. Pratyush Prabhakar, now an alumnus of VNIT
In sept 2006, Prayaas came to existence which now has grown into a concrete well planned activity supported by the Technical Education
students which Quality Improvement Program (TEQIP), Govt. of India
Mission / Vision:-
PRAYAAS is an official social initiative program of VNIT, Nagpur
This program is inspired by the vision of Dr. A. Abdul Kalam of making education compliant to societal needs and providing knowledge connectivity to rural India
Working methodology :-
- Started by a group of 10 people, Prayaas now has more than 60 members spanning the complete domain of students in the institute
*Professor incharge: Dr. P M Padole
*Team incharge: Dr. Peshwe
- Meeting of all committees organised every Thursday to discuss various issues and to monitor the work done
Teaching the Under Privileged:-
-The members of Prayaas are involved in teaching the children of construction workers on a regular basis in the VNIT campus
-About 20 students were motivated to rejoin school
-The nation’s pride of Independence & Republic days are shared with these kids each year
Shradhanand Anathalaya:-
-A house of about 60 Girl Students
-Education provided in school inadequate
-Provide supplementary education
-Subjects like Maths and Science taught
Prayaas Book Bank:
Every year at the end of the semester Prayaas collects the used books of all the students from their hostels.Mostly the final years donate all their books to the book bank as they wont use it further! What we do after collecting is,we will put a poster in the hostels which comprises of the list of the books that we collected and students who wants these books can take it from the book bank!! We take a minimum amount of 5o Rs as deposit and give these books to the students.And at the end of the semester we again take back the books that we issued from the book bank and also collect new books from everyone! In this way we are increasing the books number every year and also supplying books to every student!! The reason why students can not get some of the books from library is there are a lot of books in the library but there are very less number of books from a particular author for a subject!! If we take Maths in first year 600 students will take this course but only 100 books of Iyengar(Book preferred by profs) are only available in the library.So in this way by collecting the used books prayaas is helping those who cant afford to buy a new book!! Recycle and Reuse:-
-Collection of used note-books from various departments
-Sorting and Binding of the unused pages from the material obtained
Village Development:-
-Prayaas has adopted two villages : Deolapar and Dhanori
Regular visits are made to these villages
-Activities carried out:
*Interaction with school children regarding facilities and future building
*Teaching them necessary sections, as requested by them
*Competitions like drawing, etc
*Interaction with families and study their problems
Villages of Dhanori and Deolapar:-
-Scholarship to meritious students of class Vth VIIIth and Xth Standards
-Distribution of sports equipments
-Setting up a small library in the school
Village Digitalization:-
-An ambitious project by student bodies which can fill the gap between the needy villagers and the social stakeholders
-Students from different colleges can provide the data of their nearby area villages to a central information centre, from where the relevant data can be segregated by the social service groups
-The whole information can be used for several uses like proper implementation of various government schemes or in case of any natural calamity or emergency
Future Proposals:-
-Helping the Gram Panchayat in making proposals to the district authorities
-Change mindset of the villagers to encourage them to strive for self- upliftment
-Collaboration with the district authorities to find an end to the water problem
-Creating awareness in school teachers for improving their knowledge in science and commerce subjects
-Design of rain water harvesting system
Self Development Activities:-
-Sevankur camps: Members of Prayaas attend the sevankur camp every year in Anandvan and Sewagram
Interactive workshops:-
-By Dr. Kishor Mahabal(2009): Sessions on the Problems faced in Village Development and their solutions
-By Mrs. Samunte Mamu (2008): Guided the members about methods employed for teaching/ tutoring under privileged children
Bihar Flood Relief Fund:-
-Monetary Collection of Rs 1,38,000 INR by Prayaas at VNIT campus
-46,000 INR was contributed by the students
-Faculty of various departments too made a kind gesture by giving a helping hand of 92,000 INR
-Money collected was forwarded to Chief Minister’s Relief Fund
ED Sheet Collection:-
-ED sheet collection from various departments
-Sheets sent to Anandwan for further processing
-Utilized for making Braille scripts for visually challenged students
-Idea conveyed to other colleges- being replicated
Goonj (Vaastra Samman) Joy Of Giving Week:-
-Material collection drive was organised by Prayaas on account of Joy of Giving week from 27th Sept – 3rd Oct
-4 trucks of used clothes and other items(computers ,TVs, bicycles etc.) were collected from 18 different colleges and other social organizations
-We also got donation of Rs.9200 during the event and the collected items were given to GOONJ , a Delhi based NGO with which we have collaborated. V-Guide:-
-Brainchild of our esteemed Director Dr. S S Gokhale
-An initiative to bring the late-comers to institute at par with the other students
-This project is running successfully with more than 150 students,10 student-faculty, covering Mathematics, Engineering Drawing, Engineering Mechanics, Computer Programming
Renaissance 2010:-
-The Idea: - To build a platform where students from best of technological, management institutes who are pre motivated towards social sector, could come to share their ideas, thought process, social work experiences esp. projects they do for a period of three days, hosted at a university premises and then work upon a the pre-defined socially useful challenge which finds immediate implementation in society.
-Brainchild of Ankit Tulsyan
-VNIT Nagpur : Host of REN 2K, the first edition
Teaching at Government school:-
-Rajkiya Valmiki Balika Madyamik Vidyalaya
-Basics taught to 3rd to 9th standard students.
-Scholarship Coaching to 4th and 7th standard students. Other notables…. :-
-Conducted competition in VNIT on ways to reduce food wastage in the hostels on 26th January,2011
-Provided voluntary support for noble purpose to the team of Swaranand, Anandwan and helped them in conduction of their event.
-Collected used cloths, mattresses, pillows from final year hostels in summer and distributed to slums.
-Collection of books, drawing board and drafter from hostels and gave these things to local NGO of Nagpur (Director of NGO : Mr. Bankar)
Social Entrepreneurship :-
-Introduction of social entrepreneurship event in Consortium’ 11,The socio-management festival of VNIT , Nagpur
-Theoretically a problem of nearby village was fictionally presented, we came up with a feasible and economically viable solution.
-Next year, we aim to practically replicate the same trend in nearby villages. It was also continued in next 3 years Consortium and in 2014 consortium the problem of anandvan was given and there was a good participation and the selected participants got a chance to visit anandvan free of cost.
