Geography Climate Awareness Week

This week the School’s Geography Department hosted a Climate Awareness Week to acknowledge the issues of climate change. This week’s theme is reflective of the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26), which is taking place in Glasgow from 31 October – 12 November.

The Department ran various activities throughout the week which had pupils engaging in the statement ‘the Earth in crisis’. The Climate Bake Off saw creative portrayals of climate change, depicting various dilemmas such as melting ice sheets and glaciers, and deforestation. During the week, all years participated in the Save the Polar Bears activity which involved creating clay sculptures of the bears and placing them on ice to see how long they would float until the ice melted.

The topic of climate change actively got us thinking about the ways in which we are sustainable as individuals and as a community. One of our aims around the School is to reduce waste and recycle as much as possible and we do this with various items such as paper, food, oil, light bulbs and IT equipment. Additionally, over the summer a great effort went into changing 985 light bulbs around the School to LED which are considerably more energy efficient. It will equate to a reduction, in the School’s carbon emissions for lighting, of around 33 tonnes of CO2 per year or the carbon sequestration of 1,581 trees. Our Grounds Team also helps protect our School’s wilderness areas through re-wilding; a process that allows nature to take its course and enable natural processes to shape the grounds and assist the ecosystem.

Year 10 shared their eco-friendly habits, explaining that they reuse their plastic bags when they can, in addition to using public transport which pupils such as Rebecca (10D) try to use as much as possible. Among the School’s staff, there are various creative ways that we are making small but impactful changes in our everyday routines. For example, Mrs Sarah Oscroft uses beeswax wraps which are compostable and Mrs Laura Evans-Jones is cutting down her carbon footprint with her electric car.