GNG College

Best Practices (2020 - 2021)

A. Green Campus Initiatives

A Green Campus is a place where environmental friendly practices and education combine to promote sustainable and eco-friendly practices in the campus. The green campus concept offers an institution the opportunity to take the lead in redefining its environmental culture and developing new paradigms by creating sustainable solutions to environmental, social and economic needs of the mankind. Greening the campus is all about sweeping away wasteful inefficiencies and using conventional sources of energies for its daily power needs, correct disposal handling, purchase of environment friendly supplies and effective recycling program. Institute has to work out the time bound strategies to implement green campus initiatives.
Best-Practices
These strategies need to be incorporated into the institutional planning and budgeting processes with the aim of developing a clean and green campus. The objectives are as under:
  • To create awareness regarding environmental policy amongst the students and the staff.
  • To maintain pollution free campus by avoiding tobacco, pan-masala chewing, smoking etc on the campus. No smoking signboards are fixed all over the premises.
  • To observe ‘No Vehicle Day’ and keep the campus vehicle free. It helps to save the fuel, avoids the environmental pollution.
  • To reduce the sound pollution in the campus, we have built the seating arrangements in the shade of trees in our campus.
  • To protect and nurture the Flora and Fauna on the campus, botanical garden is being maintained
  • To maintain green campus, Green Audit is done regularly.

B. Energy and Waste Management

Preventing the environmental pollution through establishing efficient waste and recycling systems, and raising social awareness of topics such as waste-prevention and recycling are among the main goals. Waste management refers to the practice of collecting, transporting, processing or disposing of, managing and monitoring various waste materials. It is important to observe sustainability in this aspect so that every bit of waste can be managed in an efficient manner rather than just dumping it all in landfills. The objectives are as under:
  • To use Solar Energy on College Campus by installing Solar Lights and Solar water geysers in girls hostel.
  • To use energy efficient equipments like LED lamps, LED tubelights etc. for conservation of energy.
  • To sensitize the students and staff regarding the use of drinking water properly for which, we have provided purified (RO aqua-guard) drinking water facilities on the campus.
  • To bring in use the ‘Rain Water Harvesting’ on the campus. Rain water is collected and it is percolated in the land.
  • To maximize the use of ICT and minimize the use of paper. It will help to go towards ‘Paperless Office’.
  • To use the solid waste through vermin-compost on the campus and use it as a fertilizer for campus plants.
  • To use ‘Use me’ Dry and Wet dust bins in the college campus so as to keep college campus clean.
  • To make the campus plastic free, staff and students are encouraged to use jute bags and carry their own water bottles. “Say No to Plastic” signboards are fixed in various areas of the campus.
  • To maintain energy management, Energy Audit is done regularly.

Best Practices (2021 - 2022)

Inculcation of Sensitization for the Elderly among students and Faculty members

Objectives of the Practice:

  • To sensitize the students about the problems faced by the elderly
  • To make the students learn how to respect them and care for them
  • To aware the students of the joy of serving and being with the elderly
  • To provide them companionship and emotional support

The context:

Aging comes with lots of wise experiences and pieces of knowledge. Visiting an old age home gives us the opportunity to spend our time with elderly people. Respecting and caring for our elders is one of the moral values which need to be inculcated in the students. The purpose of these visits is to make the students realise their social responsibilities towards senior citizens. Such visits also activate the students’ thought process to realise the agony and pain which the people go through in their old age while living away from their dear ones. The visits intended to teach them how to interact with the elderly who may have poor hearing and understanding along with other health problems as a result of old age. The conclusion aimed was firstly, to find out how our students could help the senior citizens & make them feel happy and secure and secondly, to create a society in which there is no need to establish Old Age Homes.

The Practice:

The visits have proved to be a life turning experience as they were filled with emotions and sentiments. The Old Age Home, Jagadhari houses approx. 30 elderly residents who are all above 58 years of age. Both men and women are cared for in this Home by benevolent souls.
The otherwise morbid atmosphere was enlivened by our presence. On behalf of our college, staff and students donated groceries, clothes and other basic supplies. The empathetic GNGites stopped by almost every bed to enquire about the resident and strike a conversation. It was surprising that all of them had stories about his/her childhood, school days, and even politics and generation gap to talk about. A short entertainment programme of dance and devotional songs brought smiles to their faces. They enjoyed our company very much. It turned out to be a new experience for the students as well as for the inmates. The message driven home was that elderly people need someone who can spare their time and affection not their precious gifts or money. All they ever needed was a compassionate soul and a holding hand. With the day’s events, the volunteers learnt the basic Principles of Humanity and the unconditional love that we need to share with the less privileged.

Evidences of Success:

The visit to the old age home was a fulfilling experience for us as we came back home with not only memories but also with some valuable lessons about basic Principles of Humanity. Thus, the visit to the Old Age Home concluded with loads of warmth and showers of blessings extended from the elderly towards our team of students and faculty members. They bid us good bye with tearful eyes but with a promise to revisit them frequently.

Problems encountered and Resources Required:

The elderly was not ready to come out of their comfort zones or rooms during the initial visits. They were not ready to share and open up with the student volunteers but with the sincere and dedicated efforts, they were brought out together at a common place so that mutual exchange of experiences can happen. This in turn gave them an opportunity to come closer to each other as well as with our team of students and faculty members. With repeated and frequent visits, they started pouring out their hearts and told us about their problems. Though the Old Age Home management was providing them with excellent emotional and physical care, still our students observed that such homes demanded frequent visits and some more spending of time with the Senior Citizens. Further, some more facilities like hearing aids and other equipments to help them overcome old age related problems could be provided. The mutual interaction resulted in a strong bond amongst them and our team. Funds were required to fulfill their needs hence staff contributed financially to cater to their needs as per the priority.

Conservation of Traditional Electrical Energy

Objectives of the Practice:

  • To reduce demand, protect and replenish supplies
  • To develop and use alternative energy sources
  • To clean up the damage from the prior energy processes
  • To achieve and maintain optimum energy procurement and utilisation throughout the organization
  • To minimise energy costs / waste without affecting production & quality
  • To minimise environmental effects

The context:

There are lots of factors that determine student success in college: good study habits, passionate instructors, valuable campus resources; these all contribute to having a positive college experience. Believe it or not, there’s another aspect of college life that is often overlooked, yet it still influences student success, and touches the lives of every student on campus: lighting. As the demand for college tuition continues to rise, so does the cost of running an educational institution. There are dozens of student facilities and miles of pathways that should be lit throughout the day. Due to constant use of electricity, lighting bills exceed the allocated budget. So it becomes essential for college administration to save electricity costs by installing energy-efficient LED lighting fixtures. Apart from saving energy and going green, there are numerous other benefits of installing LED lights on college campuses.

The Practice:

Fortunately, advancements in lighting technology, ranging from more-efficient components to increasingly sophisticated controls, along with the eagerness of energy providers to boost efficiency, offer attractive opportunities for making the most of our campus’s lighting system. Almost all street lights, toilets and corridors are provided with the LED fittings. LED lighting is practical for our campus since it works so well for various installations, including: walkways, buildings, parking lots and structures, gymnasium and administrative offices. Along with providing better light quality, color rendering, and reduced energy consumption, LED light bulbs commonly last longer than 10 years, keeping maintenance costs at a minimum. These lighting solutions have helped a lot in maintaining campus security, providing better quality light, improving student safety, and giving facility managers a sense of peace that comes with purchasing long-lasting products. They have resulted in better CCTV resolution. In addition to this, they have reduced the burden of electricity bills of the institution. Using LED lights at educational facilities saves lighting utility costs and reduces maintenance expenses. Switching to LED lighting has observed electrical energy reductions by a remarkable percentage. Safety during evening activities and night time transitions between the campus hostels is essential. On average, walkways and common areas require 12 hours (or more) of lighting per evening. These LEDs have catered to that requirement very efficiently.

Evidences of Success:

When it comes to return on investment, campus lighting may rank among the most-promising of areas. When considering available options, one should take care to select products that are based on proven technologies. The fact remains that the application of LED lighting retrofits at our college premises can easily be justified as economical alternative based on the energy and maintenance savings. In addition, our students are acutely aware of the need for environmental-friendly solutions, an LED lighting system has enhanced the image of our educational institution. LEDs are extremely energy efficient and consume up to 90% less power than incandescent bulbs. Since LEDs use only a fraction of the energy of an incandescent light bulb there is a dramatic decrease in power costs. Also, money and energy is saved in maintenance and replacement costs due to the long LED lifespan.

Problems encountered and Resources Required:

While LED based solid-state lighting continues to gain ground, and several major challenges have been solved, some still remain. Energy savings and the savings that a long product lifetime brings certainly have spurred adoption in a long list of applications. The disadvantages and problems encountered include: High up-front costs, Transformer compatibility, Potential color shift over lamp life, Performance standardization has not yet been streamlined and Over-heating can cause reduced lamp life.

(1) Light Flicker:

Unlike incandescent lighting, where the tungsten filament element exhibits a long time constant, LED lighting responds instantly to changes in drive current, so current ripple and supply glitches will result in light flicker. The issue of flicker is still often glossed over by manufacturers but it is still a challenge.

(2) Color Temperature (especially during dimming):

Consumers are accustomed to incandescent bulbs, which have a color temperature that “warms” as they are dimmed. Warmer light is associated with the ambiance in a dimmed environment and is what consumers naturally prefer. Most dimmable LED lighting today results in a dull, harsh white light.

(3) Thermal Management and Operating Lifetime:

Poor thermal design and management can dramatically reduce the actual operating life well below what is claimed in lighting marketing literature. The temperature inside a closed lighting fixture can easily rise above 60°C and at these elevated temperatures, the passive components in the LED driver circuit, including electrolytic capacitors, will see reduced operating lifetimes and could result in a thermal runaway condition.

(4) Cost:

LEDs unlike conventional light sources for example incandescent bulbs cannot effectively cool themselves. For this reason additional heatsinking or cooling means are needed to prevent overheating. While high thermal conductivity materials are often used to propagate the heat out over a substantial area, these high thermal conductivity materials come with the addition of significant weight and cost. This raises the cost of not only the light sources as a result of shipping costs and materials costs but also the fixtures which use those light sources. (5) Light Pollution: Glare and spill light, and halo effect light, are known as as light pollution. By the very nature of their design and operation, LEDs produce a directional light output. LEDs are small, concentrated sources of directional light, and may often times create glare when used for general illumination. The glare could be very annoying and discomforting.

(5) Light Pollution:

Glare and spill light, and halo effect light, are known as as light pollution. By the very nature of their design and operation, LEDs produce a directional light output. LEDs are small, concentrated sources of directional light, and may often times create glare when used for general illumination. The glare could be very annoying and discomforting.
best-practices-image-1
best-practices-image-2
Old Age Home-img11-min
use of vermicompost for college nursery and vertical gardening-img33-min

Best Practices (2022 - 2023)

Educating Students and Faculty Members about Elder Sensitization

Objectives of the Practice: The objectives of this practice were:

  • To raise students' awareness of the issues faced by the elderly
  • To teach the pupils how to treat the elders with respect and consideration
  • To inculcate in the students the value of helping the elderly and spending time with them
  • To offer emotional support and companionship to the elderly

Context:

Getting older brings with it a wealth of insightful lessons learned. We get to spend time and gain from the experiences of elderly people when we visit an old age home. One of the moral values that students should be taught is to respect and care for their elders. Visits to Old Age Home are intended to help the students understand their social obligations towards the elderly. These trips also help the students' cognitive processes to become aware of the suffering and anguish that elderly people endure when living apart from their loved ones. Further, the goal of the visits was to educate them on how to communicate with senior citizens who may have various health issues related to ageing, including hearing and comprehension. The goal of this practice was two-fold: first, to identify ways in which our students could assist the elderly and give them a sense of security and happiness; and second, to design a society in which Old Age Homes would not be necessary. Hence, the ultimate goal is to sensitize the youth towards the aged.

The Practice:

The visits were emotional and sentimental, and they turned out to be a life-changing experience for approximately thirty senior citizens who were over 58 years old and lived in the Old Age Home in Jagadhari. We added vibrancy to the otherwise gloomy atmosphere of these kind souls. Staff members and students offered food, clothing and other necessities on behalf of our college. Nearly every bed was visited by the sympathetic GNGites who spoke to the residents and found out more about them. It was unexpected but a pleasant surprise that each one of them could share anecdotes about their early years, school experiences and even discuss politics, the generational divide etc.

Smiles were spread during a brief devotional song and dance programme by the students. They thoroughly enjoyed having us around. Both the residents and the students found it to be a satisfying experience. The point that elderly people need someone who can spare their time and affection rather than their priceless gifts or money was hammered home. All they ever required was a helping hand and a kind heart. The volunteers gained an understanding of the fundamental values of humanity and the need of showing unconditional love to the elderly.

Evidences of Success:

We had a great time visiting the elderly home and we left with more than just fond memories; we learned some important lessons about the fundamentals of humanity. With love and blessings bestowed upon the visiting group of students and faculty members by the elderly, the visit to the Old Age Home came to an end. With teary eyes, they bid us farewell and we promised to visit them often. Our college authorities are planning to adopt this Old Age Home.

Problems encountered and Resources Required:

When they were first visited, the elderly were not prepared to leave their rooms or comfort zones. Although they weren't prepared to talk and share with the student volunteers during initial visits but with our sincere and committed efforts we not only succeeded in bringing them together in a shared location but gradually we also made them comfortable enough to share their experiences. As a result, they were able to strengthen their bonds with our group of facilitators and students as well as with one another. They began opening up to us about their issues and pouring out their hearts during increasingly frequent visits. Even though the Old Age Home administration was giving them best emotional and first-rate medical care, our students felt that these facilities required more frequent visits and financial help from samaritans. Additionally, services like hearing aids and other facilities to help them deal with age-related issues could be offered. They eventually developed a close bond with our team as a result of the interactions. Our faculty and students contributed financially to meet their needs. The contributions were made to meet their needs on priority basis.

Preservation of Conventional Electrical Power

Objectives of the Practice: The objectives of this practice were:

  • To lower demand, safeguard and restock supplies.
  • To create and employ substitute energy sources.
  • To repair the harm caused by previous energy processes
  • To attain and sustain optimal energy procurement and utilisation across the entire organisation
  • To minimise energy costs and waste without compromising production and quality
  • To minimise environmental impacts

The context:

A student’s success in college is influenced by a variety of factors, including strong study habits, engaged professors and useful campus resources. All of these things go towards making college an enjoyable experience. Unbelievably, there is another facet of college life that is frequently disregarded, but it nonetheless affects every student’s experience and success: lighting. The cost of operating an educational institution rises in tandem with the demand for college tuition. Numerous student facilities require continuous lighting during the day. Lighting costs tend to surpass the budgeted amount because electricity is used continuously. It is therefore imperative that college administration installs energy-efficient LED lighting fixtures in order to reduce electricity costs. Installing LED lights in college campuses has many advantages beyond just being environmental-friendly and energy-efficient.

The Practice:

In the college, the majority of lights in the classrooms and restrooms have LED fixtures installed. It is crucial to ensure safety when moving between the hostel complex and campus at night and during evening events. So the common areas and corridors that need to be lit for at least 12 hours every night have also been installed with LED lights. These LEDs have done a great job in meeting various requirements. In addition to offering lower energy consumption and superior light quality, LED light bulbs typically have a lifespan of more than ten years, which minimises maintenance expenses too. Electrical energy usage has decreased significantly since LED lighting has been used and has proved to be cost-effective.

Evidences of Success:

Among all areas, campus lighting may be the most promising in terms of return on investment. Compared to incandescent bulbs, LEDs can save up to 90% on energy consumption thereby resulting in a significant reduction in power expenses. Furthermore, the extended lifespan of LEDs has also reduced maintenance and replacement costs thereby saving money and energy.

Problems encountered and Resources Required:

Even though solid-state lighting based on LEDs is still gaining popularity and many significant obstacles have been overcome, some still need to be overcome. Though LEDs have been adopted widely due to energy savings and the cost savings that come with a long product lifetime, however high upfront costs, transformer compatibility, possible colour shift over their life tenure, a lack of performance standardization and the possibility of reduced lamp life due to overheating are some of the drawbacks and issues.

Sensitization-Towards
Preservation-of-Conventional-Electrical-Power