Christ College Students take a fresh approach on sustainability

PUPILS at leading independent school Christ College Brecon have established an initiative to make the school more sustainable in a campaign to reuse, reduce and recycle.

Sixth form students at Christ College Brecon have launched an initiative to ensure the school is working towards being more sustainable. The initiative includes a recycling program, distribution of reusable drinks bottles, and raising awareness of the environmental impacts of the school and how it can become more sustainable.

The pupils have introduced a recycling programme that includes recycling bins in all common rooms, houses at the school and main areas as well as a crisp packet recycling programme with TerraCycle and bins with biodegradable bags for food waste.

Each school house has elected Senior House Representatives who will monitor their house’s recycling and ensure all waste is collected.

A points system has also been set up to encourage the whole school to get involved and engage pupils in every house. Every bag of general waste accumulated by each house will be added to a spreadsheet to monitor the amount of waste going to landfill. At the end of the month the house with the least number of bags of general waste will get points awarded to them.

As well as their recycling program the pupils aim to ensure every pupil at the school has a reusable water bottle provided by Christ College. Pupils from year three to eight were the first to receive reusable bottles with them being rolled out across all year groups and staff at the school.

Curriculum for Life project leader, Liz McLean, who is supporting sixth form pupils with the initiative said: “This is a great initiative and a worthwhile challenge. We are very proud of the Lower Sixth pupils for leading it. They expressed a desire to make the school more sustainable and wanted to make a difference.

“The group agreed on ways to do this and presented these to the school. They are very forward-thinking pupils and are very passionate about ensuring the initiative is implemented. We are behind them 100% and the whole school is doing their bit to improve the school’s sustainability and support the students and the initiative.”

Set within the Brecon Beacons National Park, Christ College is an independent co-educational boarding and day school, with 380 pupils on roll between the ages of seven to 18.