Waste not the waste

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A story of CHANGE brought about byPANCHAYAT UNION MIDDLE SCHOOL,ODIYATHUR,Villupuram District, Tamil Nadu.

The Team

StudentsMohammed Ashiq, Sivaguru & Anandan

Guide Teacher: A.Sagaya Arockiadass

When we had a brain-storming session on what that needs our immediate attention for CHANGE, we zeroed in on the eggshells we throw out everyday. Under the state government’s free noon-meal scheme all the 225 students of our school get boiled eggs EVERYDAY and the eggshells are thrown out as waste.

We decided to utilize the eggshells in a useful way and thought over various ideas. With our own ideas and inputs from other sources like the internet we decided to make EGGSHELL MOSAICS, EGGSHELL DECORATIVE UMBRELLAS and EGGSHELL POWDER as a calcium supplement to be used in our school laboratory.

We asked students to put the eggshells in dustbins placed specially for the purpose.

Based on size we sorted the eggshells as LARGE, MEDIUM and SMALL.

• In cardboard we drew outlines of figures like flower, dinosaur, house, mountain and Donald the duck.

• We fixed glued eggshells on the figures; after it dried we painted the eggshells with appropriate colours. AND what we got was wonderful EGGSHELL MOSAIC PICTURES.

• We chose the largest

eggshells which are nearly semispherical and painted their outer surface with patterns. These eggshells were attached to ear-buds (swabs) to look like umbrellas.

• Placed in small vases they adorn office and reception tables and attract everyone’s attention.

• We collected all the remaining eggshells and put them in a cloth bag. We pounded the eggshells with hammer. After pounding hard we got the eggshell power.

• Taking a small amount of eggshell powder in a test tube our Science teacher added some diluted Hydrochloric Acid. Some gas emanated from it; when a burning match-stick was taken close to the gas it went off with a ‘pop’ sound. The teacher said it was Nitrogen gas and the eggshell powder is a supplement for calcium carbonate.

• We gave the eggshell powder to laboratory to be used as calcium carbonate.

• After finishing the project we were indeed overwhelmed to realize how a neglected waste could be turned into worthy objects.

• If just a few days can give us this wonderful CHANGE, we wonder what we will get if we go on doing this all through the year.

• After all we get eggshells EVERYDAY; if we carry on what we have done in this one week for all the weeks in a year we are sure that we are going to make hundreds of useful articles. We may even sell them and use the money for school’s development.

• With our Headmaster and teachers, we pledge that we will carry on this humble mission of CHANGE to bring about more changes.

• We cordially thank DFC for enabling us to turn into CHANGE-MAKERS.