Biodiversity in Sustainability. A vision for St Greg’s and the future

Biodiversity Certification.. Last week, St Gregory the Great Primary School received,after much hard work by Mrs Somerville and Mr Phelan, their Biodiversity certification from CERES. As you may remember St Greg’s has embarked on their journey towards becoming a 5 Star Accredited school in the area of Sustainability. We have now achieved 3 stars out of the 5, these being in Core, Waste and Biodiversity so we are well on our way will see us renew our Core and Waste certificates and work towards achieving our next star in Water usage.

What is Biodiversity? Biodiversity is the study of animals and habitats or ecosystems and how animal and insect life combine to live in harmony with the environment. Factors within the school which we can focus on that impact on Biodiversity include littering, soil erosion, controlling vegetation through weeding and looking after garden beds and watering plants.

Where do we go from here? 2014 will see the school increase their awareness and study of sustainability. SRC members will become Environmental Leaders and they will be able to report back to the SRC and suggest areas that can be worked on at Working bees. Buddies in Foundation (Prep) and Grade 6 will explore sustainability with a hands on approach around the school such as watering gardens from saved water and picking up litter. Junior school buddies may take on responsibility for the vegetable garden and grow flowers over the summer months rather than vegetables and these can be used in the office to beautify the school. We view Sustainability as very important to our school and the community in general because we only have one world and we need to take care of it..