The awareness and drive within this field has been building over recent years throughout the school and is prominent within our House system where we already have Community Representatives from each Form who have taken part in various environmental projects and also in the School Council meetings where it is evident that students care strongly about making a positive impact, however, they, alongside staff and Governors, are keen to do more.

We are hopeful that this generous donation from DS Smith will form the start of a longer term relationship that would help us, over time, encompass initiatives on education, traineeships and work placements as well as assistance with physical infrastructure improvements which will have a positive impact on the environment.

Projects that will be enabled as a result of this donation include a range of initiatives aimed at reducing our carbon footprint, improving our recycling and decreasing our plastic and food wastage including:

Empowering students: This initiative would give our elected student Community Representatives further responsibilities and opportunities; allowing these important young school ambassadors to better promote the message that there is the need for us all to be more consciously aware of our environment in order that we take collective responsibility for our own community. There is considerable scope for linking with the local DS Smith plants to enable students to visit and see the DS Smith recycling process in action and for representatives from DS Smith to visit the school in order to help educate our students in the wider circular economy.

Recycling: The school has already invested in recycling bins in the outside environs, offices and classrooms. We now aim to extend this significantly to the catering area in the Concourse and key corridors which will maximise collection of single use plastics, paper and card. Bins will be branded with the DS Smith logo to promote the significance of a circular economy to our society and their key position driving this locally and globally.

Single use plastics: The school is replacing existing water fountains with water filling stations that can cope with more students filling bottles simultaneously. The aim is to eliminate single use plastic bottles currently sold on the school site by producing NSB/DS Smith branded reusable drinking bottles; providing a drinking bottle for each student to reuse, significantly reducing the school’s negative impact on the environment.

Paper and Cardboard: This type of waste is currently sorted in-house and then collected and disposed of in a more traditional manner. If paper and cardboard could be collected by DS Smith and fed into the DS Smith circular economy, it would be reused within 14 days.

Herb garden and tree: Within our Citizenship qualification students will utilise a patch of land at the front of the school to establish a herb garden that contributes to the meals produced in the canteen. A tree will be planted to enrich the environment. This aligns with our promotion of sustainability and will give students access to industrial specialists from DS Smith where they can seek advice and guidance on their moral and practical development in relation to wider issues as well as environmental promotion and schemes.

Lindsay Greenaway
Richard Murphy