This year in Environment Council our aim was to improve sustainability. We focused on increasing the awareness of this issue within our school and wider community by participating in events, and working with larger environment-based organisations.

We partnered with Eco-Action and went to various tree plantings throughout the year. We planted native trees in the wetland areas around East-Christchurch. 

This helps to provide areas for native fauna to thrive in their natural environment and have enough resources to maintain life. Our school planted and re potted...and re potted again hundreds of trees in our greenhouse to go towards the thousands of new trees around our community. 

Along with Sustainable Coastlines, our Environment Council attended two beach clean-ups around our coastlines. We collected bags of rubbish contributing to the almost 2 million litres of rubbish Sustainable Coastlines have collected, sorted, and recycled. 

Within our school, we primarily put our focus towards the Environment Council Week in Term 3. We organised a clothing swap where students were able to bring in their preloved clothes and swap with other students. 

This encouraged people within the school to recycle unwanted clothes in a more sustainable way. We also held a sustainable makeup lesson where we learnt about ways to make common hygiene products, such as body scrub, in a more sustainable way, using naturally sourced and recyclable materials. We added sustainability to students' everyday life by holding a free beeswax wrap workshop. 

Students came in and were able to make a more sustainable way to wrap their lunch. These activities were held in the hopes that we could increase the visibility of these issues and our school could reduce unsustainable consumption. 

Throughout the year, many environment council members tended to our school gardens during lunchtimes. We finished the year by creating posters about where to shop sustainably. This year we had tonnes of fun with planning these events and hope we positively contributed to our school and community. We hope the Environment council to thrive for years to come.

Neeve Edwards-Brown, Head of the Environment Council 

Kaitlyn Courtney, Deputy-Head of the Environment Council