Online seminar held on environmental education

ALIGARH  : Environmental experts and academicians discussed the various aspects of environmental educational and emphasised the need for developing sensibility in students towards the various conservational ways and means to protect the earth from degradation in an online national seminar on “Environmental Education” held by the Department of Education, Aligarh Muslim University to mark the Wold Environment Day.

In his presidential remarks, Dean, Faculty of Social Sciences, Professor Nisar Ahmad Khan stressed the need to integrate population, environment and natural resources policies into national developmental strategies to ensure sustainable development.

“No doubt development is the need of the hour, but it should not be at the cost of adversely affecting the viability of the environment. Students need to be taught about the various means to bring sustainable practices and Universities have greater role to play in this regard”, he said.

Guest speaker, Professor M.T.V. Nagaraju (Dean, Faculty of Education, Indira Gandhi National Tribal University) highlighted the importance of environmental education and underlined the teachers’ role in changing the students’ behaviour towards environmental conservation. He pointed out that complete development of an individual’s personality depends on the kind of both physical and social environment that persists around him.

Another guest speaker, Professor M Govindan (Head, Department of Educational Psychology, Tamil Nadu Teacher Education University) said efforts need to be made at the institutional level not only to provide awareness about environmental issues to the students but also to equip them with environmental values and skills for safeguarding their surroundings and solving the ecological problems.

Welcoming the guests, Professor Mujibul Hasan Siddiqui (Chairperson, Department of Education and Director, National Seminar) emphasized that proactive efforts are required on the part of all involved in education for bringing positive changes in the environment and to achieve this goal, training courses for teachers and administrators need to be held regularly at different levels of education system

In her concluding remarks, Convener of the seminar, Professor Nasrin said proper environmental management is vital and it is important to harmonise the relationship between environment and man so that quality of the environment and human society is improved. She also proposed a vote of thanks.