In week three of Term 2, six students and two teachers from King’s High School’s Enviro Club undertook a Litter Intelligence Training Course. Thomas Bowen, Kane Chang, Samuel Dorne-Cumming, Cam Fraser, Jimi Higgins and Ashwin Rajesh all went along, with Mr McPherson and Mr Bleckinger also participating.

The course trained the teachers and students on how to properly collect and record litter on St Kilda Beach to take part in a statistical investigation. It was no coincidence that many of the boys were from Mr McPherson’s statistics class. Everyone turned up to the beach with smiling faces except for Jimi Higgins who was still crestfallen after his election loss, running for Enviro Club Chairman. 

The course was run by Ben Knight from Sustainable Coastlines. The thinking behind the course is very important. Sustainable Coastlines is engaging with communities around Aotearoa, providing the training, equipment and technology required for people to take part in the programme as ‘Citizen Scientists’. A main area of the course was sorting litter as data was to be collected on certain types - and believe me there were multifarious litter classifications. Now, as Citizen Scientists, those trained can run the St Kilda Collection Area. The boys were happy to report that little to no rubbish was found on the beach. We found 15 items of litter. 

After collection and classification, the data was recorded and everyone became certified. It was a great day considering that morning it had been raining excessively. I think I can speak for everyone when I say that as Litter Intelligence Training Courses go, it was exceptional. We are all looking forward to our first collection time.

By Samuel Dorne-Cumming