Flow: facilitating learning on wash
Student name: Ms Niyati Seth
Guide: Dr Arun Kansal
Year of completion: 2016
Host Organisation: The Energy and Resource Institute (TERI), New Delhi
Supervisor (Host Organisation): Mr Anshuman
Abstract: Access to safe drinking water and sanitation is a human right and the school students, the future of the nation, requires adequate safety when it comes to access and availability of drinking water and sanitation facilities. To realize this, thirty marginalized and vulnerable schools in three cities (Bhubaneswar, Indore and Ranchi) were undertaken to improve the situation of WASH. A need assessment was conducted to identify the water usage areas in a school along with the quantity and the quality of water resource available for each school. The actual water demand of a school was estimated through the data collected from the thirty studied schools. This value ranges from about 16 L to 20 L per student per day. Further, safe drinking water infrastructure like purification systems, drinking water platforms, storage systems, filter water storage platform etc. were proposed based on the need assessment, feasibility study, water quality reports, etc. Connection of water for toilets was also proposed along with water conservation structures like rooftop rainwater harvesting systems. Based on the assessment and recommendations, a model school in Bhubaneswar was developed for WASH infrastructure. The implementation on field not only included hard engineering but also soft engineering like awareness generation and capacity building, which associates to the behavior change amongst the students. The soft skill set also creates a sense of ownership, making the infrastructure sustainable, which ultimately points to the healthy life of a student. Around 12, 600 students will benefit from such a program and nearly 12.5 million liters of water can be conserved through rooftop rainwater harvesting systems.
Keywords: WASH, WASH in Schools (WinS), School Water Demand, Potable Water, Water Conservation
