Ecogroup minutes

Minutes of Ecogroup Feb 6:
We discussed how we could get the school to take some practical measures to make it more environmentally friendly.
One suggestion was that we should ask teachers, administration staff, students and parents to follow more environmentally friendly policies such as:

Teachers and admin staff should:
• Encourage students to use both sides of the paper when doing exams or tests.
• Encourage students not to start a new page for each piece of work, but to underline last piece of work and continue on the same page.
• Photocopy on both sides of the paper when doing worksheets that are more than a page long
• Encourage students to do work in their exercise books rather than on fill-in worksheets.
• Re-use photocopies that are not required revision purposes.
• Put waste paper in the recycle trays in each class.
• Log-off and put the computers on stand-by whenever they leave the class and to turn the screen on to hide rather than turn it off altogether if another teacher is going to use it.
• Ensure lights are turned off at break, lunch and after school in every classroom.

Senior management should:
• Avoid sending too many short letters home as it wastes paper, but instead combine communications on one page or better still send e mails home or post notices on the school webpage instead of sending letters home, especially bulky information like parents guides.
• Order shorter exercise books as the present ones are often not filled by the end of the year and a lot of paper goes to waste.
• Ensure the bins in the patio are labelled with the material that should be thrown into them eg plastic, paper, organic.
• Ensure the bathrooms by the auditorium have time-limiter taps installed as on the first floor.
• Install dual flushes and water regulators for the taps in the bathrooms to save water.

Students should:
• Take more care about where they throw their rubbish and take greater pride in the school environment.
• Ensure recycle trays are emptied into the special paper bins on the corridor and then empty them in the main paper bin by the entrance.
• Separate waste in the playground bins.
• Not waste paper in exercise books
• Encourage parents to follow more environmentally friendly policies at home.
• Turn off lights in class rooms.

Have you got any more ideas? Let us know if you have.