By VICTORIA STONE-MEADOWS
THE Patch Primary School has been running an environmental management program for the students for about 15 years, but this year a branch of sustainability studies was added.
“The school has a philosophy of environmental education,” said teacher and sustainability co-ordinator Naomi Campbell.
“We wanted to teach the kids how to take that information home and make a difference to the planet.”
The Patch Primary School participates in the Victorian Government’s RecourceSmart Schools program and can earn stars in environment education modules of Biodiversity, Core, Energy, Waste and Water.
“We earned the biodiversity star last year and this year we decided to split it in two,” said Naomi.
“I took the waste module and that is how the sustainability program started.”
The students involved in the sustainability program went on an excursion to the rubbish tip to gain an understanding of what happens to all of our rubbish.
They also wrote a letter to the Keep Cup Company, on behalf of planet Earth, to ask if Keep Cup would supply the school with Keep Cups to use for hot chocolates instead of the disposable ones that end up in landfill.
The students are also taught a more general environmental responsibility that Naomi Campbell says sticks with the students as they grow up.
“We see past students at footy and things like that and they always say how they still have certain projects going.”
“We hear it from high school teachers as well,” she said.
“They say they can always recognise Patch kids because of their passion for the environment and their responsibility to the world and to other people.”
