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Green Schools.

 

Water Workshop

Just before our midterm.break 4 members of our Green Team attended a Green Schools Water Workshop at Wood Quay.

We learned all about water and its properties, did a few experiments, listened to a presentation on water treatment and worked on our Water  Action Plan.

We enjoyed the bus trip into the city centre and the walk down the quays to the centre. We will be sharing all we learned with the school community .

 

 

Our Green Schools Committe- 4th Classes-  met Dale Treadwell from Fingal CoCo for a tree planting workshop.

Dale had lots of stories for us about trees / wildlife and their importance .

We planted native saplings in the school garden- oak, birch, Holly, Hazel and mountain ash. We look forward to working with Dale again. 

  

  

 

 

Green-Schools, known internationally as Eco-Schools, is an environmental education programme run by An Taisce in partnership with local authorities. It promotes long-term, whole-school action for the environment.

Here in Rolestown we are following the Green Schools programme to enable us to take environmental issues from the curriculum and apply them to the day-to-day running of our school

There are eight themes in Green Schools:

Litter and Waste.

  • Energy.
  • Water.
  • Travel.
  • Biodiversity.
  • Global Citizenship – Litter & Waste.
  • Global Citizenship – Energy.
  • Global Citizenship – Marine Environment

We have earned the Litter & Waste and Energy Flags.

Through this work we have in place best -practice regarding litter reduction, reuse and recyling and have used various campaigns over the years to support this e.g. banning of Single Use Plastic items such as plastic bags, plastic straws and plastic bottles.

The Energy Flag inspired us to look at how we can conserve electricity in our school and homes – switching off appliances when not in use, only using lights when necessary and availing of as much natural daylight as possible.

We are currently working towards the Water Flag

Greener schools not only save energy and conserve resources, they also help municipalities address whatever regional environmental problems they may be facing, such as water use, storm water management, air quality, recycling, or mold problems.

Never before has it been so vital to be climate ambassadors , building awareness in our school, community and beyond of the part we all must play in saving our beautiful planet.

 

Green Flag

Jan 2019:

Single-Use Plastic is a concern of ours and we are planning to be rid of it in our school. Single-Use plastic is self-explanatory – plastics we use once and dispose of immediately- plastic bottles, plastic straws, plastic cutlery and plastic bags. Our slogan is:

Let’s be…Single-Use Plastic-free!

We try to use beakers for our water and lunch boxes for our lunches. We don’t need tinfoil or clingfilm then… We are remembering to ask for paper straws. WE don’t need plastic cutlery and we plan to use more cloth bags – bags for life!

We are raising awareness  throughout the school and the wider community here and through bulletins we post throughout the school. We continue to try to recycle as best we can, but reducing the amount of plastic we buy and reusing what we can is best.

Remember: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle! (properly!)

Save electricity: Switch off appliances when not in use

Switch off lights when not needed

Only boil the amount of water you need in your kettle.

Try to dry clothes outside.

Pull the blinds in the evening to keep the heat in and open up the blinds during the day for solar-gain

Oct 2018:

With two flags achieved for our school – Litter & Waste and Energy, we continue to do our best for our environment.

Our Green Schools Committee meet each week and update the school community regularly  about what we as a community can do.

Our current concern is Climate Change. We are leaning about the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change ( I.P.C.C.) and what work it does. Also we are looking at the Paris Agreement and what that entails for Ireland and our pledges to reduce consumption of fossil fuels for our energy. We are aware that Ireland will not meet its 2020 targets for using more renewable energy and being less fossil-fuel dependent. Mr. Bruton tells us we will meet our 2030 targets. Meanwhile Mr. Trump and the USA don’t want to be part of the Paris Agreement. He thinks that Global Warming is a myth!

Jun 2017:

Our school community cares deeply about environmental issues and wishes to make positive changes in our environment. For this reason we are part of Green-Schools which is an international environmental education programme. In 2014 we were awarded our first Green Flag for Litter and Waste. We are currently working towards our second flag for Energy. Our Green Schools Committee with the whole school community are working together to increase awareness of energy issues and to improve energy efficiency in the school.

In keeping with our Green Schools ethos we:

  • Use lunch-boxes and beakers only for our lunches, i.e. reusable containers.
  • Avoid using packaging such as cling-film, sandwich-bags and tinfoil
  • Ensure our recyclable waste is not contaminated- we clean and dry it- e.g. rinse and dry our yogurt pots
  • Sort our waste daily into composting, recycling and landfill
  • Keep doors closed to keep the heat in
  • Switch off appliances and lighting when unnecessary

 

We look forward to working together to achieve our second flag soon and will be in touch in September with lots of information regarding the energy-crisis and tips regarding energy -saving.

For further information regarding Green Schools follow the link below .

Green Schools – Seven Steps

We hope to have our first green flag very soon, which is for Waste and Litter.

We have looked at our waste disposal throughout the school.

Using the maxim:  REDUCE,  REUSE,  RECYCLE,  we are trying to :

1.  REDUCE the amount of packaging we bring to school with our lunches.

So: Let’s not use: Tinfoil, clingfilm, plastic bags or kitchen paper.

Let’s use lunchboxes only.

Let’s use beakers rather than plastic bottles.

All other waste/packaging, we hope to REUSE  or RECYCLE.

4th Feb 2017:

Dear Parent,

We are in the process of applying for our second Green Schools Flag – the Energy Flag.

To achieve this we must retain our current flag for recycling by:

  • Ensuring we are recycling as much of our waste as we can
  • Ensuring we are recycling as well as we can

by using the REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE maxim:

REDUCE: Let’s be careful with our lunches

Beakers and (lunch) boxes are best.

Try not to use any packaging where possible – clingfilm and sandwich bags are not recyclable

soft wrapping e.g. popcorn bags are not recyclable

tinfoil is recyclable but do we need to use it?

REUSE: Try to reuse plastic bags, tinfoil, plastic bottles whenever we do use them

RECYCLE: clean, dry: paper, cartons, cardboard, strong plastic wrapping and bottles

Remember, recycling saves energy, key to our energy saving quest!

We will be keeping in touch, updating and sharing energy-saving tips with you...

 

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