Sustainability

Sustainability at Mount Helena Primary School

In line with the Department of 'Caring for our Country - Our Sustainability Framework', we are working towards supporting a healthy, liveable environment and contributing to creating a fair, inclusive society by developing a community of like-minded, future-focused and caring individuals.

At Mount Helena Primary School we are committed to a whole-school approach to environmental education, of which waste minimisation, litter reduction and water wise practices play a vital role. We believe the teaching and learning environment should be safe, caring and clean for all members of the school community.

Through our various programs and recycling initiatives our students are learning to rethink the products we purchase, reduce the amount of waste we create, reuse as much as possible and recycle whatever we can. Our main objective is to minimise the amount of waste we take to landfill. This will lead to financial savings for the school, considerable benefits for the environment and most importantly many varied opportunities for students to develop ecologically-sound attitudes and habits.

Staff and students at Mount Helena Primary School are committed to ensuring we are a litter free school. It is our aim to have the least amount of litter in the school buildings and grounds. This will make our school more attractive and save money and time in collecting carelessly discarded litter. It is important from a health viewpoint. Through our Litter Legends initiative, we aim for students to realise the importance of valuing and conserving the clean drinking water that is not always enjoyed in other parts of the world. Our students actively engage in Litter Legends, tidying the playground enthusiastically.

Currently Mount Helena PS actively engages in the following recycling programs and activities:

• Waste Free Wednesday
• Containers for Change
• Bread Ties for Wheelchairs
• Paper recycling
• Soft Plastics recycling
• Compost collection
• Worm farms
• Vegetable gardens
• Battery recycling
• Recycle your old pens

Through these practices we strive to achieve the following goals:

• Develop environmentally sound attitudes, habits and values in our students;

• Educate the school and wider community about the waste wise/water wise/energy wise messages;

• To support pupils in taking responsibility for a sustainable world;

• To educate students and wider community about ways to reduce, reuse and recycle;

• Continue to reduce waste generated at school to as low as practically possible;

• Examine and audit the waste collected to reduce and re-educate where necessary; and

• Enhance the beauty of Mount Helena Primary School.

Our Litter Legends in action