Feature

Memorable events in Copenhagen

Miti Annesha

I am a child journalist of Shishu Prokash (Children's Express) run by MMC (Mass Line Media Center). It is supported by Unicef. In November of 2009 I got a chance to visit Copenhagen. There was a Children Climate Forum conference on climate change. It was between 28 November '09 to 4 December '09. There were four of us in total. They were from Satkhira, Noakhali and Bhola. We had also two chaperones with us from Unicef.

On 28 November we went to the City Hall in Copenhagen. It is a very historical place. We saw that there were several boards for each country. We found the board for Bangladesh where we hung some photos of the climate affecting areas of Bangladesh. The delegates from the other countries just looked at the pictures and were completely shocked. It was beyond their imagination that Bangladesh was this much affected by climate change. Many journalists came to us to learn about the consequences of climate change in our country. After lunch the Mayor of Copenhagen inaugurated the conference very festively.

The following day we went to a school in Copenhagen. We were amazed to see our national flag in their classroom. We told them about our country, Bangladesh.

Next, we went to Denmark supply division of Unicef with them. Finally the last day came. We felt so sad for each other. We had a great party at night. We performed a drama on climate change. Everybody liked it. We also sang and danced together. ABC (Alien Beat Club), the famous band team of Denmark sang for us. We enjoyed it very much.

We learned a lot in those 7 days. They trained us how to make a project and solve it. They trained us how to make solar power, drip irrigation system and made houses according to the climate of a country. We also had some skill training on communication of arts, radio, advocacy and online media. We also learned how working with adaptation and mitigation.

I got to know many things from all these trainings. Rajshahi is a drought prone area. It has a great problem for water. During the drip irrigation system, I got to know how we could prevent it. The main thing I learnt from this conference was how I can prevent the present climate situation in my country.

It was really a very beautiful event in my life. It's a great achievement for me that I can never forget.

(The writer is a student of Class-ix, Agroni School & College, RUET)

TLC organises training for BRACU faculty members

Syeda Samara Mortada

THE Teaching and Learning Centre (TLC) of BRAC University organized the semester-wise training from 8-10 May for all new faculty members who joined BRACU in the last few months. This time there was a total of 28 participants; the facilitators were Prof. Md. Samdani Fakir, Pro Vice Chancellor, Mahfuzul Bari Chowdhury, CS, Savar, Psychologist, Farida Akhtar and Samina Anzum Chowdhury, Jr. Lecturer, TLC.

The workshop started on Saturday, 8 May with a session by Prof. Samdani where he introduced the workshop, talked about the objectives, mission and then asked each pair which were formed earlier to list down ground rules on Social Capital which might then be shared by all of them. He also talked about the synergy between BRAC and BRACU and how it can be maximized by the participants. The registrar of BRACU, Ishfaq Ilahi Choudhury also came in later in the same day, to give some professional guidelines for BRACU instructors followed by the VC, Dr Ainun Nishat who shared his own experiences of the practicalities of teaching with the participants.

Farida Akhter in her sessions talked about behavioural attitudes of students and Mahfuzul Bari in his session spoke on the Residential Semester at the Savar campus. Finally, on the 10 May, Prof. Mumit Khan, Chairperson of EEE, BRACU shared the system of Student Grading at BRACU which was a reflective and informative lecture.

The last day of this three-day workshop, was a reflection session where each participant said something about the workshop.