Sustainability in Schools: Ideas to get you started

This is a 1 Million Women community guest post from Eve White.

If you're my age, perhaps you have fond childhood memories of riding bikes without helmets, running around hatless all summer, and your family using and disposing of plastic products with abandon with no awareness of the impacts of our habits. The behaviours that we grow up with are our own "normal". It is in early childhood that we develop our core values, attitudes, skills, behaviours, and habits, and these can take many years to change – if they ever change at all.

As parents, then, we are in a position of both extraordinary responsibility and power. We have a moral duty, as well as the ultimate motivator – love for our children - to act on climate change for the sake of future generations. Fortunately, we are in a uniquely powerful position to make lasting change. As a parent of school-aged kids, you have the most incredible opportunity to do good, not just by demonstrating a new "normal" to your own children, but by making changes within your school community that will filter out to all the families within it. In fact, it's hard to think of any other group within society that is so well positioned to influence the future of the world.

In 1997 UNESCO identified that "education is humanity's best hope and most effective means in the quest to achieve sustainable development". But you do not have to be a teacher to be part of the education process. Most schools rely on enthusiastic parents to help with all sorts of activities, including organising events, fund raising, and participating in working bees. A good starting point would be to join your school's parent's association and attend their meetings or make an appointment to speak to the principal to find out what sustainability initiatives the school is already undertaking. Once you've put up your hand to get involved and sussed out what's already going on, the possibilities are almost limitless.

Related: Vietnam's Farming Kindergarten and Community Garden

Kick-starting sustainability in your school community

Help organise your annual school fete or fair, with the goal of making it "low carbon" or zero waste. A group of parents in Tasmania designed a three-step process to achieve this, and there are some great case studies and lots of advice here.

Get your school involved in Plastic Free July. The Plastic Free July organisers have put together some excellent resourcesto help schools, and their website provides some inspiring examples of how different schools have participated.

Get a group together to work towards making your school "zero carbon" like this fantastic group of high school students in Nowra, NSW. This is a big goal that would benefit from having a couple of supportive teachers and a keen group of kids, but is a fantastic way to empower young people to make practical and positive changes and to apply their maths and science skills to real world problems.

Tired of the traditional raffle ticket and plastic-wrapped chocolate fund raising drives? There are so many more sustainable ideas, many of which require very little effort. For example, you could organise a mass recycling program through Terracycle , a company that recycles difficult items such as coffee pods and toothpaste tubes. You set up collection bins and send off the packaging to the company, which pays two cents per item to your school. Alternatively, if there are a few creative parents around you could make something to sell. This website has some other great ideas too, such as earning a commission for your school by selling reusable sandwich wraps.

Organise an event through your school to increase awareness of environmental issues and raise funds for sustainability projects. This primary school in Victoria hosted a "Green Evening" that attracted 400 attendees. In just one hour the school raised over $2,000 to donate to environmental organisations and school sustainability projects, recruited six new families to participate in working bees, and showcased the school's sustainability projects to the community! An endeavour like this requires quite a lot of time and support from staff and parents. If you have the time and the right support from your school, why not go for it? If not, you could organise something far simpler, such as an environmental movie night to raise both money and awareness of issues.

Being an influential parent

Most parents have some level of involvement in the school community at some point. It makes good sense to make your contribution benefit our environment as well as the school. There are so many different ways you can get involved that there is bound to be something that will suit you regardless of your skills, time and commitment levels. One thing you can be sure of is that a contribution of this kind will have ripple effects far beyond the hours that you dedicate to it. By getting involved in your school community, you are doing your bit to create a new "normal", not just for your own child but for many others, and perhaps their families too - and the values learnt in childhood can last a lifetime.

Eve White is full time mum and part time freelance editor with a PhD in ecology. She lives in southern Tasmania with her husband and two young kids and is trying to help more parents get involved with campaigning for climate action with her Facebook group, Australian Parents for Climate Action.

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Images: Unsplash and Pixabay

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