The Spirit to #EducateTheGirlChild – Madras Christian College, Chennai (September)

I’m free to be the greatest, I’m alive
I’m free to be the greatest here tonight, the greatest
The greatest, the greatest alive
The greatest, the greatest alive
Greatness stems from the simplest of thoughts and actions. However, it is often misunderstood that being great puts one on a pedestal while everyone else tries to catch up. The military ideal of ‘Leave No Man Behind’ is in fact the brutal truth that fuels the philosophy of greatness.

An enlightened bunch from Madras Christian College (MCC), an iconic educational institution located in the suburban region of Chennai, decided to venture the brutally true ideology, a path that is rarely chosen.

Simplicity is key.

The potential value of trash is massive. A baby step towards realising it is to collect it, in order to establish a visual cue of the amount of waste that each one of us generate, day-in and day-out. This bunch decided to do exactly that, within their own campus.

Recyclable trash from Margaret Hall loaded onto our Paperman’s mini-truck late evening at MCC.

On September 13, a call was registered with Paperman from a student of MCC enquiring about trash collection services in their area. Little did the either one of them know that it was going to change the fate of the girl child in India.

“I got to know about Paperman from my seniors, because we, as a hall, have been associated with Paperman for almost 4 years now.”

Mr. Haandi, Paperman at Tambaram (Chennai), doing a final check on the recyclables
We do this every year in collaboration with our half-event Dionysia. As students of MCC, we take great pride in doing our bit for the society. This year, too, we had a paper collection drive. However, we were not satisfied with the quantity of paper that we procured. That’s when we started collecting all kinds of recyclable material from the other halls as well. We had old fans among other things, even the belongings of our alumni, which had been in our hall for more than a year now. We decided to dispose off all of these and finally a substantial amount of material was gathered!

It felt really good to see all those old, not very useful items taken away by Mr. Haandi; and it being of use to all of us. That’s what urged me to click the pictures. We all were really elated about it, and you guys are really doing a great job of motivating us to do something really good for the society.” shared Roshini, the General Secretary of Margaret Hall at MCC.

More than 300 kilograms of recyclable material was collected by Mr. Haandi on the evening of September 14, creating a trash value amounting to almost INR 3500.

It takes INR 3500 to educate a child for an entire year.

The money was donated towards Project Nanhi Kali, a social cause in Paperman’s network that works for the education of the girl child in India.

“Thank you so much for being so co-operative. Whenever we wanted a change of date or timing, you were of great help. We are grateful to people like you who can help spread a smile!” added Roshini.

Trash is certainly the new change. A simple act of collecting and recycling waste can create an unimaginably constructive ripple effect in our society.

Great, isn’t it?

Source – https://medium.com/@Papermandotin/the-spirit-to-educatethegirlchild-ec0cabd9c987#.bn9eifgci