CHANGE MAKING AT SPRINGS – NEWS FROM OUR SUSTAINABILITY GROUPS

Waste Wise

Waste Wise is a student group at springs where we work on sustainability issues and attempt to make our school the most sustainable it can be. Our goal for the past few years has been to be one of the first zero waste high schools in the country. We are working hard at achieving this goal by the time we move into the new school.

We also run and organise events to promote sustainability; my personal favourite would have to be the school clothes swap. Last year was a huge success with vast amounts of clothing donated from school and the community. The main aim within our clothes swap is to ensure the students are aware of the impact their clothing has on the surrounding environment. A huge percentage of clothing ends up in landfill which ends up contaminating the landfills with toxic chemicals. Then clothes swap allows students to get a range of free clothes and revamp their wardrobe without spending a cent, but also helping the environment and slowing the demand for fast fashion.

Mia Vaughan-Young

Staff Bike Challenge Victory

For the third year now, the staff at Springs took up the challenge of Aotearoa Bike Challenge for February. This challenge pits companies/institutions against each other. The aim is to encourage as many people to get on bikes. This year our staff truly got into the spirit of cycling. The staff bike rack was bulging, the staff room was filled with conversations about cycling.

All together we had 44 staff members riding a bike during the month. Commutes, rides that would replace a car journey, contributed to saving our environment over 700 kg of CO2. And of course, we won. Well, we won the category for schools in NZ of similar sizes. Within Auckland, we came second across all industry types, for our size. Who beat us? Jasmax: the architects of our new school. All up, we can be proud that our staff are willing to “walk the talk”  in relation to our school’s strong sustainability ethos.