RCB to Collaborate With Oxford India Centre For Sustainable Development

The Rotary Club of Bombay has signed a LoU (Letter of Understanding) with the Oxford India Centre of Sustainable Development (OICSD), Somerville College, Oxford University, UK, to peer review a curriculum on Environmental Science and also establish Rotary-Oxford scholarships for pursuing post-graduate studies at OICSD in Environmental Science (EVS) and Sustainable Development (SD).

DGE Sandip Agarwalla, whose brainchild this partnership is, says this idea started developing in December 2020 when he was stuck in London with a bout of Covid. He had been thinking of building an association with Oxford and happened to have a friend who was associated with OICSD.

DGE Sandip says, “My friend Rtn. Nayan Patel, Advisor Oxford India Centre for Sustainable Development (OICSD), Somerville College, University of Oxford and Advisor, Rotary India Literacy Mission, put me in touch with the OICSD.”

During his recovery, he worked with the Oxford team to spell out the scope of the alliance. “We decided to focus on a curriculum for environmental science and scholarships,” he says.

Upon his return to India, he put together a team for each area. For the curriculum team, he pulled in Rotary Club of Bombay’s PE Vineet Bhatnagar, Rtn. Nandan Maluste and PP Pradeep Saxena, and, also, Rotary Club of Mumbai Kalakar’s PE Sree Nandy and Rotary Club of Hiranandani Estate’s President Nasir Shaikh. DGE Sandip says, “We raised funds and awarded the design of the course to a group of Ph.D environmentalists who are now working with Oxford on the syllabus.”

The course will be extra-curricular and will be for students of standards 7, 8 and 9. It will first be rolled out as a pilot project in Palghar for 10,000 students. “After that, we will take it to all of Maharashtra, India and then internationally also. So, it is going to be that world-class. It will be in English, Hindi and Marathi, and also feature an e-module. We plan to also teach it through the cloud and Rotary India Literacy Mission (RILM).” All of this includes teacher-training too. DGE Sandip has planned for the course to be in place by July 2022.

Subject to philanthropic support, the scholarship will provide the beneficiary the opportunity to do Master’s and DPhil programmes in Sustainable Development at Oxford University’s Somerville College. “The scholarship is for deserving students from diverse backgrounds. We are inviting philanthropic and CSR donors to join us for a virtual Roundtable Conference jointly with OICSD titled “Rotary Oxford Roundtable – Towards Sustainable Development” on 21st September, 2021 aimed at preparing India to meet future challenges by developing leadership among talented young Indian students. Our goal is to increase the number of scholars at the Oxford India Centre for Sustainable Development by establishing the Rotary-Oxford Scholarships.”

It will showcase the existing OICSD Indian scholars and their research and seek to attract philanthropic/ CSR interest in funding such a scholarship, either on an endowment or expendable basis.

The team for fund-raising includes DGE Sandip, PE Vineet Bhatnagar, PP Vijay Jatia, Rtn. Vineet Kedia, Rtn. Vivek Kothari, and Rtn. Rohan Dalal. DGE Sandip says, “These are the members of our scholarship committee who are going to look at this.”

DGE Sandip believes that this valuable partnership forged with OICSD promises to go a long way and be the harbinger of even stronger ties and more activities with each other.