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GREEN SCHOOLS AWARD

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What is the Green Schools Award?​

 

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Green-Schools is an international environmental education programme, environmental management system and award scheme that promotes and acknowledges long-term, whole school action for the environment.

In order to achieve Green School status, schools use a seven step process to work through different environmental themes.

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St Brigid’s JNS have two Green Flags, and are applying for our third flag this year.

 

Recycling & Waste Flag

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In 2012 we achieved our first Green Flag for Recycling & Waste.  Here are some of the things we do to promote recycling -

  • All waste paper, plastic water bottles, yoghurt cartons, milk cartons and all plastic packaging from the children’s lunches are recycled. 

  • All of our fruit peelings, teabags and pencil shavings are put on the compost heaps in the garden, and used in the school garden. 

  • Photocopying has been greatly reduced. 

  • We participate in the An Taisce National Spring Clean day each April. 

  • ‘Anti-litter and anti-graffiti’ weeks have been run in conjunction with other community organisations and schools. 

  • We came second in the country in the Repak Green Schools awards in October 2012. 

  • The number of black bin bags removed from the school daily has been reduced from a whopping 45 per week to 1 (yes you read correctly – ONE!) per week. We have 20 Green Wheelie bins of recyclable material each week, and 25 litres of food waste going to the compost. 

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Our Recycling code is "St. Brigid’s is the best ... because we clean up all our mess"! 

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Energy Flag

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We achieved our second Green Flag for reducing Energy in 2014. 

 

We focused on educating ourselves about energy saving, and did lots of lessons on energy saving in class. The children conducted ‘energy audits’ to establish where we could save energy. We then looked at various ways in which we could be more energy efficient in school and at home. We discovered the main culprits were leaving lights and appliances on all day. Everyone is trying very hard to remember to: 

Turn off the lights when we leave a room 
Turn off the interactive whiteboard when it’s not in use 
Turn off the computer screens when they are not in use 
Close the door when we leave a room to keep the heat in 

‘Energy Detectives’ carry out random checks on rooms at break times, and leave a note if a class has forgotten to turn off something! 

Our Energy Code is ‘St. Brigid’s is our name … saving energy is our game’! 

 

Water Flag

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We are applying for our third Green Flag for saving water this year.

Our water green code is ‘Clap, clap, clap ... Stop ... Turn off the tap!’

This reflects our main focus. All sinks have signs saying ‘Just 2 will do!’ The children use 2 pushes of the tap to wash their hands. All classrooms have basins for cleaning up after art, rather than letting the tap run. A water butt has been installed to collect rainwater for watering the garden.

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The Green School Committee participated in An Taisce National Spring Clean on April 26th.  Water Awareness Day also took place on April 26th.  All Classes did lots of fun activities to learn about saving water.

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Green Schools
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