Each room in Grasshoppers Day Nursery has a wide variety of materials available for junk modelling activities, however, the Eco-Committee decided to take junk modelling to the next level. Having researched ecobricks, parents are asked to contribute empty plastic bottles, the Eco-Committee then diligently gather in the garden area and tightly fill them with soft plastic, using a stick to push the plastic down and eventually creating a strong building brick. Children are then responsible for counting the ecobricks (developing maths skills) and deciding what they will construct with their ecobricks (expressive arts and design), all whilst discussing the importance of recycling (communication and language). The Eco-Committee are now busy constructing ecobrick chairs, tables and colourful walls for their nursery garden!

During Spring Term, the Eco-Committee at Cherry Orchard Primary School in Worcester focused on reducing the amount of waste generated by their school community.
First, they discovered that the Tetrapak cartons they use in school were recyclable in their usual recycling collection, providing they are cleaned properly. The Eco-Committee, Gardening Club and Reception Team are now responsible for cleaning these cartons. This means that Cherry Orchard are now preventing between 500 and 600 Tetrapak cartons from going to landfill each week.
The Eco-Committee then decided to sign up as a Terracycle hub for crisp packet recycling – so far they have recycled over 7,100 crisp packets whilst also raising funds for their school. The Eco-Committee use weekly newsletters and assemblies to encourage their classmates to pester their family and friends to collect crisp packets for them!
For the second year running, they are also taking part in Duracell’s Big Battery Hunt and are currently filling their 6th!!! barrel of used batteries – they manage to collect so many batteries through hosting a termly competition to see which year group can collect the most batteries.
As younger children receive free fruit snacks, fruit waste has also been an issue in the school. Now Cherry Orchard collect their waste and feed it to their three on-site wormeries. The wormeries turn this waste into liquid fertiliser, which can then be used on their allotment and sold to parents under the catchy name of ‘Vitamin Pee.’
Cherry Orchard are constantly looking for new ways they can reduce the waste produced by their school and its community. Most recently they have discovered and signed up to a dental product recycling scheme . They have received their collection box and pupils, parents and grandparents have already begun dropping off old toothbrushes and finished toothpaste containers.

The Eco-Committee at Christ the King Primary School in Liverpool decided to tackle the issue of food waste for their latest Green Flag. After seeing supermarkets around Liverpool appealing for food bank donations, hearing (from Mr Rivera their school cook) that their school produces a lot of food waste and then learning that there are many people around the world starving – the Eco-Committee decided to take action.
The most important decision they made in their food waste action was to include Mr Rivera in their discussions – they learnt the company he works for already tackles food waste by receiving donations of food close to its ‘best before’ date from supermarkets (otherwise this food may be wasted). Mr Rivera then agreed to use the blackboard in the canteen to display the lunch menu so that children know what to expect when queuing up. Finally, with the Eco-Committee Mr Rivera worked to improve the school menu: the Committee told Mr Rivera the food they enjoy eating most and then they decided to make the lunch menu flexible e.g. if you order fish and potato wedges this usually comes with beans, but now if a child doesn’t like beans they can swap for an alternative like peas. Now children are enjoying their lunches more than ever and the school is producing much less food waste!

Children in the Eco-Committee and Entrepreneur Club at Damers First School worked together to design, make and market an eco-product called Waxtastic No Plastic, the children even designed their own logo!

Waxtastic is a piece of 100% cotton material dipped in Dorset beeswax and dried. It is used as an alternative to cling film to wrap or cover all foods except meat. It is 100% eco-friendly.

The children sold their product outside a local supermarket, at a farmers market and even at festivals over the summer holidays. They have raised an extraordinary £3350 so far and are planning to use this money to create a nature area (with a pond)!

The Eco-Committee at Woodland Community Primary School decided to participate in Eco-Schools National Call to Action (Re)Love Our Stuff: a project aimed at tackling the stigma surrounding second-hand clothing by putting pupils in charge of planning and promoting a second-hand, pop-up clothes shop. The pupils on the Eco-Committee loved planning their shop and their schoolmates were very excited to go shopping, even school staff and parents managed to buy things for themselves and relatives. The survey they completed before and after their action (Step 5: Monitoring and Evaluation) showed a massive change in attitude towards second-hand clothing. It was such a success the Eco-Committee at Woodland have planned to introduce a (Re)Love Our Stuff shop every term!

The Eco-Committee at Thornton College decided that as part of their Action Plan they would tackle food waste in their school. First food waste was researched, with a focus on why food waste matters. The Eco-Committee discovered food waste increases greenhouse gas emissions by up to 10% and that we waste enough food each year to feed every single person in the UK 3 meals a day for 3 months. They also discovered two different types of food waste, production (e.g. potato peelings) and plate (what is left on plates after meals).

Whilst the Eco-Committee knew that the catering team at Thornton College already does a lot to reduce waste (composting, oil recycling, stocks and soups using production waste) they also knew that they and their schoolmates could do more. Over a week they measured their schoolmates combined plate waste – finding 153 kgs of food (or the equivalent of 300 lunches) is wasted in their school each week. They spoke to the school chef – who further outlined the problem and offered simple solutions for example returning for seconds, rather than overloading plates, or asking for a small sample before deciding on their lunch.  The Eco-Committee shared these tips with their schoolmates. To further outline the plate waste problem in their school, the Eco-Committee also pledged to collect 153 kgs of food for a local food bank – to provide context for just how much food waste their school is producing each week! Their next steps are to repeat their survey and find out if their actions have made a difference!

The Eco-Committee at John O’Gaunt Secondary School decided that they wanted to look at recycling as part of their Action Plan, specifically items that are not recycled as part of their communities curb-side collections. With the help of a student’s parent they designed a simple piece of kit which made collecting, storing and bundling up crisp packets for recycling much easier and efficient. Their communities local online newspaper, Penny Post, donated two of these kits to the school and these were built by the Eco-Club and installed in school. Another member of their school community, has now volunteered to regularly collect the crisp packets and take them to the communities local Terracycle/supermarket facility for recycling. It’s been a real community project (perfect Step 5: Informing and Involving) and the next step for the Eco-Committee is to get everyone using the recyclers – creating less litter and waste in their school!

The Eco-Committee at Ashfield School in Nottinghamshire, decided to make their Christmas Jumper Swap an annual event in an attempt to reduce pupil’s personal Carbon footprint. Whilst the first year concentrated solely on Christmas jumpers, their most recent Christmas Jumper Swap included handmade, eco-friendly crafts including pom pom decorations and bracelets made from wool gifted to the Eco-Committee. Gifts tags made by repurposing old Christmas cards and Christmas decorations made from the bottoms of plastic bottles used to make the school’s recycled bottle greenhouse (another great project) were also sold! The Christmas Jumper Swap, was fun to organise, prevented old clothing being sent to landfill, new clothing from being bought and even raised £134 for future eco-projects. The Eco-Committee are now already planning ways to extend their Christmas Jumper Swap next year!

Each form at St Marys was challenged with creating a mini garden for their Grub in a Tub Eco-Schools action. The unique aspect – that makes this a waste topic action – is students were only allowed to use recycled items be it: tin cans, old wellies or an adapted squash bottle!
Apart from containers being made from recycled items the only other rules were everything planted must be edible, herbs, fruit, vegetables, or even editable flowers, and the container chosen must not exceed 1m x 1m. Students were provided with a starter kit, which could be supplemented with items from their own homes and gardens, and a bag of compost. They were also encouraged to decorate their containers, the picture shows GLASTHOMEBURY – a tribute to Glastonbury Festival.
A winner from each year group was selected and prizes and certificates awarded.

With a massive 2500 Students, Ashfield School is one of the biggest in the country! Having only had an Eco-Committee for less than a year (at the time of writing), they have already used the Eco-Schools Waste Topic to initiate change. They have launched the Big Battery Hunt as an inter-form competition and already sent a shipment of batteries to be recycled. They have also signed up to crisp packet and contact lens recycling with Terracycle. Having completed a whole school waste week, they managed to collect 300 plastic bottles, which will now be used to create a bottle greenhouse. Ashfield have even sourced school ties made from recycled plastic! In December 2019, they hosted a Christmas Jumper swap and are following this with a school uniform swap. Next they are planning a women’s clothes swap in the local community. On top of this, recycling has been greatly increased in the school, not by investing in new, fancy bins or focusing on negativity, but through gradually changing the way people think. In the short time their Eco-Committee has been running they have achieved loads – if a school their size can do it anyone can!