Award for Stephen

Everyone was delighted with the Award for Commitment to the Environment went to Stephen Hanna, staff member, who has joined in the work of our Eco Group. Stephen has looked through all the work already undertaken by the group over the past three years, and is helping us to focus on the work ahead for our Green Flag. The Award is made each year by governor Jean Forbes. So far the award has gone to students who are working or studying on environmental issues. This year we decided that it was right to honour a staff member who does both!

Eco Decoration

As well as our Eco friendly, recycled cardboard Christmas trees, courtesy of the Woodland Trust, we have decorated out canteen this year with the free Christmas wrapping paper distributed by the Guardian. The paper has been commissioned from a range of designers and celebrities and each one of them sparks off controversy about the meaning of Christmas.

Recycled Christmas Trees

Oour Eco group spent today's meeting putting together a pair of Christmas trees supplied by the Woodland Trust and made from recycled cardboard. The trees come with recycled cardboard baubles and look great! Our Eco Warriors also put up a series of seasonal posters in the canteen, which came free with the Guardian newspaper, and which represent the ideas of various artists and celebrities about Christmas. Look out for them!

Wildlife Group goes Planting

The Wildlife Group has been out planting bulbs and native species trees. Their next step is to organise some temporary fencing to alert the grounds maintenance team to the baby trees and growing plants.

Watch Out

9 Bearnagh has just launched its Eco campaign in support of the Green Flag Group. If the Green Flaggers need a survey done or a campaign launched, 9 Bearnagh will do the leg work. So far they plan to focus on making sure our outdoor recycling starts to really work. They also want to do some research to see if it really matters if we don't take the tops off our plastic bottles before we recycle. They will be organising the 4.00pm check on teachers' rooms and will check our fuel use and the separation of our indoor rubbish. Watch out!

Eco Group Tuesdays

Our Eco Group now meets on Tuesdays in room 121 to fire ahead and win our Green Flag. Be there!

Yo We've Won our Silver Award

I am delighted to announce that we have just won our Silver Eco Schools Award. The Award is of course for our wholeschool efforts, but special mention must be made of year 10 who did all the surveys and checking and auditing last term. We will soon present the Award to Shimna and put a framed copy up in the entrance hall so that everyone who comes into the college will know the high value we put on preserving our environment. We are delighted that staff member Stephen Hanna is coming on board to work with our Eco Group to put together the bid for our Green Flag. Well done everybody.