Environment & sustainability committee

Chairperson	Ligita Mikutaite
Email	environment@kegworthpublicschool.com

goal

The Environment & Sustainability Committee exists to promote environmental sustainability, educate stakeholders, and increase the positive impact of initiatives for the broader community.

Projects

Currently, Kegworth has numerous recycling and waste-reducing initiatives in place that we encourage the students and their families to get involved with and support. These include:

In-class waste reduction initiatives

• All classes having:
  • a collection for soft plastics so they can be recycled
  • their own reusable cutlery 
  • compost bins (for the worm farm and central compost bin)
  • Orange Enviro Bags to collect 10c containers, which may have been used in lunches
  • Paper Recycling bins
• Waste-free Wednesdays – this is an initiative that encourages students to have ‘waste free’ lunch boxes every Wednesday which means there is no throwaway packaging.

Recycling initiatives

• Envirobank – orange bags – bring plastic or aluminium bottles containing the 10c label to school. These bags are also hung in the junior and senior playgrounds and we encourage students to use them if they have drinks from the canteen after eating time.
• TOMRA – Kegworth is a Donation Partner with the Market Place Return and Earn initiative. Choose Kegworth when depositing glass, plastic or aluminium containers with the 10c label 
• Lids for Kids: Along with saving this many containers from landfill, we have also collected a great number of lids, which will be forwarded onto “Lids for Kids”. This organisation uses the lids from containers (which can’t be recycled with the bottles) to make prosthetic limbs for children. ON HOLD DUE TO COVID
• Toothbrushes/toothpaste: We support the recycling of old/used oral care products. We collect old toothbrushes (including the changeable tops of electric toothbrushes), empty toothpaste tubes and floss containers. The packaging from these products may also be placed in our clearly labelled collection bin, which is sitting near the library entranceway on the table outside the library. We will then send them to TerraCycle, a company that turns these items into other products. Through our participation, Kegworth will be eligible to win some garden products made from these recycled plastics.  
• Borrow and bring back bag: We encourage our students to use these instead of plastic bags when they bring or take things from school. These are situated in the Lords Rd link-way hanging on the big boomerang. This boomerang to indicate the bags should be Boomeranged back, was made by the Haberfield Men’s Shed. The funds which paid for the boomerang were won by 4R from NSW Teachers Federation in 2019, for the commencement of the Envirobank initiative. Celia Morris from Shorties also donated 100 calico bags and the screen printing on each bag was also donated by parents
• Metal Cups: The School is holding $100 which was won in 2020 from NSW Teachers Federation by a group of girls who sewed the calico bags for each classroom to hold the reusable cutlery. These girls wanted to buy metal cups with the money for the canteen so they stopped using plastic throw-away cups for the jelly and frozen milk. These will be purchased once the Canteen dishwasher is operational.  
• Bread tags: 
• Mobile Phone Recycling: 
• Worm farm: The worm farm uses compost to feed the worms. The worm juice is then bottled and sold with profits going towards the sustainable learning area.
• Compost: All classrooms have a compost bin which is emptied into a compost bin regularly. The compost is used within the school to help with the gardens.