November Newsletter!
Wow! The first half-term of the academic year went by in the blink of an eye, we hope you all had a relaxing half-term and are now rejuvenated and ready to continue empowering young people to protect our planet!
As you are aware, our new and improved Eco-Schools portal launched in October and since then we have had incredibly positive feedback from many of our wonderful Eco-Coordinators, so if you haven’t logged on and had a look around yet – please do by clicking below!
The new application process, is designed to be completed in any order and updated throughout the academic year as you work on the Eco-Schools programme… and because many of you have already begun completing the application questions we can say that the (current) biggest Eco-Committee in England has 60 young people on it, whilst the average Eco-Committee has around 15 young people on it. Since October, the new application process has also let us know that this academic year there are over 7,300 young Eco-Committee members (so far) in England… but we also know there are many, many more! It would be fantastic if we could get this figure higher before Eco-Schools Manager Lee presents at COP 26 on Tuesday 2nd November – so log on to your Eco-Schools account and use the application to tell us how many young people are on your Eco-Committee!
National Eco-Committee
The closing date for 10-18 year olds to apply to become a member of our inaugural National Eco-Committee is Saturday 20th November, so if you have the perfect candidate – tell them to apply now using the link below!
The National Eco-Committee, is our way of safeguarding the youth–led nature of the Eco-Schools programme. The selected group of 25 passionate young people will work alongside the Eco-Schools Team, awarding body OCR, work experience charity Speakers for Schools and children’s author/environmental activist Georgina Stevens to green the school curriculum and help shape the Eco-Schools programme moving forward!
Environmental Review
By now most of you will have already formed your Eco-Committee and are thinking about completing the new Eco-Schools Environmental Review!
If you haven’t downloaded the latest version yet, click below to log into your Eco-Schools account. Then click ‘Our Application’ on the left hand side of the screen, begin your Eco-Schools application and then go to the Environmental Review section. Finally, click the resources drop down arrow to download.
When completing your Environmental Review, don’t worry too much about low scores, the last academic year was severely disrupted and the reason you’re working through the Seven Steps is to make your school more eco!
COP 26, Make Every School an Eco-School
Alongside speaking at COP 26, the Eco-Schools Team and Keep Britain Tidy are simultaneously launching our Every School an Eco-School call to action.
With 8.9 million pupils currently attending a school in England, we can only imagine the collective influence of these institutions and young people if they were all empowered to create positive change, reduce carbon emissions and influence their wider communities to do the same. As part of our call to action, we are also calling for all Eco-Coordinators to be given remission in recognition of additional work undertaken to coordinate youth-led environmental action. You can read more about our call to action by clicking below and visiting the Keep Britain Tidy website.
Learning About Forests
Don’t forget to sign up for our free, international Learning About Forests (LEAF) programme.
A perfect Biodiversity or School Grounds action, the LEAF programme engages nearly 1,000,000 young people across 28 countries around the world helping to raise awareness about our forest ecosystems.
From ancient woodlands to local parks, from school grounds to backyards, from trees to lichen the LEAF programme enables all who take part to reconnect with nature in their local community. Click below to Learn About Forests.
Examples
As always, we are on the lookout for examples of Eco-Schools work that we can feature on our website. These examples inspire Eco-Coordinators and Eco-Committees across England. So if you are planning a recycled Halloween costume competition, a way to use up leftover pumpkin, or any other unique/impactful eco-projects please use the link below to share with the Eco-Schools Team! We would also love to hear from you if you have tackled any of the Seven Steps in a effective or unique way!
As for the Eco-Schools Team, we have recently been inspired by our friends at Frugi, click the text to view their wonderful guide for having a more sustainable (but no less fun) Bonfire Night!
And Finally…
As mentioned Eco-Schools Manager Lee Wray-Davies will be speaking at COP 26! She will be speaking in the Green Zone on Tuesday 2nd of November alongside our international colleagues between 3:30 – 5:00pm. Whilst tickets are sold out – you can click here to support Lee virtually and learn about other Foundation for Environmental Education programmes such as Blue Flag Award for beaches or Green Key Award for hotels!
As always, stay safe and be proud of yourself – you’re making a difference!
Lee, Karyn, Francis & Shona
