Adelaide primary school on bold mission to wipe out waste and have no bins in seven years
Posted
Students from the Immanuel Primary School have set themselves an astonishing goal — to cut the entire school's waste to just one wheelie bin per week.
Eventually, they'd like to remove all waste bins from their campus altogether.
It's all part of the Keep South Australia Beautiful (KESAB) and Green Industries SA state-wide Wipe Out Waste schools program.
As part of the program, grade three and five students at Immanuel participate in a "sharing the planet" unit.
"After the unit last year, a group of year five students decided that we need to form a group and look at what we are doing at school," Immanuel Primary School's Sarah Nash said.
Ms Nash said the plan they came up with was to make the school landfill-free within the next seven years.
To achieve this goal, recycling and compost bins have been set up through the school, and students are taught how to use them to limit their waste.
Several times throughout the year, a group of students sort through general waste to audit how well the school is tracking.
"The hard thing is just changing habits and reducing plastic wrap," Ms Nash said.
Encouraging change at home
The now grade six students who set the school's goal have become very passionate about the program succeeding.
"I've learned that we all need to reduce our waste and not use too much plastic," Emily said.
"[Plastic] can harm the environment and harm animals in the sea."
The students even take their newfound knowledge home.
"I've been asking my parents to put less things in plastic," Emily said.
"They are not doing too well but they are getting a little bit better."
"I now use containers and reusable wraps [for my lunch]," Paris said.
"I know that I am making a difference."
State-wide program educating students
KESAB program coordinator Jo Hendikx works with schools throughout the state to try and get them to adopt similar programs.
The students are encouraged to create recycling and composting programs and have audit days to monitor what is being thrown into bins.
"Students are often surprised by the amount of uneaten food that hasn't been touched that goes into bins," Ms Hendrikx said.
She said food wastage commonly came from parents trying to do the right thing, overloading lunchboxes with options for their child.
"The goal [of Wipe Out Waste] is to eliminate the need for bins at a site," Ms Hendrikx said.
"We now have around half a dozen sites around the state who don't have bins."
Topics: recycling-and-waste-management, primary-schools, human-interest, environment, adelaide-5000
