Sustainability at Belrose
At Belrose Public School we place a big focus on sustainability. We educate all our students through fun, hands-on activities that create impact, with the aim of cementing long-term knowledge, commitment, and action from our students.
Recycling
At Belrose, we are committed to reducing waste & diverting as much waste from landfill as possible. We have ‘waste stations’ throughout the school where we recycle paper, co-mingling, soft plastics, and food.
All students are regularly educated on which bin to place their rubbish and the message of why we do this is reinforced. Different students are selected to assist with sorting through this recycling each Friday to ensure it’s not contaminated. We also separate Return and Earn which provides us with additional funds for the vegetable garden. You can now select our school as a recipient of funds when doing your own Return and Earn. Each year, we conduct waste audits where different classes go through our landfill waste from the week prior and identify what else should have been recycled by our students.
In Term 4 we learnt that each family at Belrose Public School produces enough waste each year to fill a 3-bedroom house from floor to ceiling! These audits have helped us all realise that whilst we’re doing an amazing job at Belrose, we can always do more!! Our aim for 2023 is to reduce waste brought into our school. Reduce, Reuse and Recycle!
Composting
At Belrose Public School we are proud to say that all food is diverted from landfill and is composted on site. This prevents dangerous greenhouse gases being produced which are damaging our precious planet. We work closely with Kimbriki Resource Recovery Centre staff, who work with our students to teach them about composting and the value behind conserving our planet earth. We have six large compost bins which are turned daily by rostered classes, and fresh compost is produced regularly. We rely on many of our students to help empty the ‘cooked’ compost bin and refill our garden beds. This rich compost enables our vegetable garden to bear very healthy crops and further reinforces the message of recycling.
Vegetable and Bushtucker Gardens
At Belrose Public School we have established a beautiful natural space for all students in the school. This incredible sensory space includes a vegetable garden, a yarning circle, and a bush tucker garden, lined by large sandstone rocks for children to meander along. Both the sensory and vegetable gardens are an open space for students to wander through during breaks and classes throughout the day.
Gardening takes place at various ad-hoc times throughout the week and at these times many students of all ages drop by to help out with gardening, watering, composting and harvesting. This past year we have produced strawberries, beans, yakuns, celery, capsicum, blueberries, passionfruit, tomatoes plus a rich variety of herbs. A highlight for everyone is watching students taste our wonderful produce! For many it’s the first time they willingly eat their vegetables. Last week we discovered the blueberries and strawberries are getting ready to be picked and our tomato plants are growing strong and growing everywhere!!
Our sunflowers are getting taller and taller which we look forward to measuring in maths, and our passionfruit vine is starting to creep across the wall. In Term 4 students planted rows of carrots that we hope will be ready for us all to harvest when we return in 2023. We look forward to tasting all these wonderful homegrown foods together at school.
Nearby we are growing a variety of native bush tucker plants for further education of our Aboriginal culture. We celebrate and learn more about these plants during Naidoc week each year. We will also be adding QR codes in the coming months so drop by and scan the code to find out more about these plants and how they are a part of the Aboriginal culture.
