WASTE NOT WANT NOT

Well here is another great thing that the students and staff are launching into, REUSE and RECYCLE. Yes, we are now looking at our waste management practices. You may not realise it, but we currently put out 11 green wheelie bins for collection 3 times a week. That is a lot of land fill. What we are trying to do is REDUCE the amount of “rubbish” we produce by looking at what we throw away and where we throw it.

Catherine Cheung of Noosa Integrated Catchment Association and Leisa Gillham from Queensland Litter Prevention Alliance came to visit with some of the classes to do an audit on their classroom rubbish bins.

With only one rubbish bin for the class everything was going into that bin, paper, food scraps, milk cartons, pencil shavings and plastic wrap. Leisa weighted the rubbish and then emptied it out onto a special audit table and started to sort through the items. She got some help from some enthusiastic students who began to help sort the items into categories – recyclable, paper and cardboard, plastic wrap, food scraps, citrus peel and general waste. Jarrod helped by recording the number of items in each group and the total weight for that group. It was interesting to see what went into which pile. Leisa knew so much about what went where that we could understand why she has the title of “Litter Champion” on her card.

With the help of Catherine Cheung and the local council we are now going to have new classroom rubbish bins. Three to be exact. Each class will receive three new bins, with identification stickers, to help them sort out their rubbish habits. One bin will be for food scraps – great for the compost and worm farm in the garden, one will be for clean paper and cardboard and recyclables. This can be emptied into the new yellow lid recycle bins. The last bin will be for general waste.

We are hoping that the teachers and students will think about where they put their rubbish. Simple really just choose the right bin and in it goes. We have been given 12 yellow lid recycle wheelie bins to help in our efforts. The council has delivered them and we are in the process of deciding where will be the best spots for them. Each class will have special monitors who will help by emptying the recycle bins daily. The cleaners will look after the general waste and put the bins out for collection.

Everyone will be able to get involved. Just by talking about what you can and can’t put into your recycle bin at home will help to teach the children. Mrs McCaul’s class is well on the way to becoming a litter free lunch class. They are encouraging their parents to use containers and reusable packaging when putting their lunch together. Some of the children are now able to have morning tea and lunch without making any rubbish. They are hoping to be able to have a totally litter free lunch before the end of the year. We are hoping that in the future we will be able to reduce the amount of land fill that we send to the tip. This will be a long slow journey that the whole school is happy to undertake.

If anyone is interested in food scraps for their chooks, worm farm, or compost please contact a class teacher to make arrangements for a daily bucket of scraps. Lots of staff and parents are already doing this.

TERRI-ANNE HARRIS

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Litter Free lunch – Nadia Dunning, Josh Bullock, Georgia Boor, Molly Keyes, Alex Postle

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Sorting rubbish into labelled collection bins – Nadia & Josh

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Nadia Dunning recording the information

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