COPE’22, more commonly known as Connecting People with Nature 2022 was a hybrid program that was organized by Kolej Tun Dr Ismail Student Committee. This program was held to give UTM students better exposure to the environment and ways to implement Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that have been stated by the Economic Planning Unit, Prime Minister’s Department to make this earth a better place and develop the same goals as our country. The program was led by a college committee member, Miss Shomya Sri A/P Sinnathamby, and was assisted by several program advisors: Dr Nurrulhidayah binti Salamun, Miss Nur Amalina binti Zulkifli Airwan, Mr Muhammad Syaiful Izzhar bin Zulkifli, Mr Muhamad Faris Hasbi bin Abd Rahim. The main purpose of this program is to increase awareness and also knowledge about appreciating plants and animals.
This program proved to be beneficial not only to UTM’s students but also to the whole community where in this program we had a lot of sessions of talk that will increase our knowledge of plants and animals. This program was held by using the WebEx Online meeting as an online platform, and for the physical activity, Kolej Tun Dr Ismail and also at Taman Negara Tanjung Piai. This program started on 8 May 2022 and ended with a closing ceremony on 4 June 2022. This program was attended by our collaborators which are the Malaysia Nature Society (MNS), as well as World Wildlife Fund (WWF), and also participants from various colleges in UTM and other universities.
This program began with two competitions which are the City Nature Challenge and Bird Race. These competitions were held on the website (https://citynaturechallenge.org/). The Bird Race competition was a photo capture challenge in which participants are required to take pictures of any bird, plant or creature while in the city nature challenge. The most talented photographer with a great picture will be named the winner. Apart from the competition, a talk session was also held and delivered by Miss Belinda Wong, the Honorary Secretary of the Malaysian Nature Society on the 8th of May 2022.
The program continued on the 13th May 2022, in which two sharing sessions were held simultaneously at 3:00 pm by MNS and also WWF concerning planting and animals. On 14th May, various physical activities were held at Kolej Tun Dr Ismail involving volunteers from all UTM colleges. The final physical activity was held on the 2nd June 2022 at Taman Negara Tanjung Piai, Johor involving KTDI’s staff and also students from various UTM colleges. The program Connecting People with Nature ended with a closing ceremony officiated by the Principal of Tun Dr Ismail College, Lt Kol Prof. Madya Dr Mohd Noor Azli bin Hj. Ali Khan