The winners of the Bayer-LEAF Education Awards were announced last week.
The Primary School Partnership award went to Nonington Farms Ltd “For a farm that has built and continues to build a successful relationship with primary schools and makes a valuable and sustained contribution to school life, both on and away from the farm.”
The Secondary School Partnership award went to Brockhill Farm “For a farm business that has gone out of its way to build a successful relationship with one or more secondary schools.”
And, we’re pleased to note that a lifetime achievement award went to NAEE’s Nina Hatch “For exceptional services to countryside educational activities over a prolonged period.” This is richly deserved and shows how lucky NAEE is in having Nina as a key player in the organisation. ∫∫∫
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Stephen Sterling and Stephen Martin have an article in the THE arguing that universities need to up their game when it comes to climate change: Climate crisis and the response-ability of universities. “It’s time the higher education community puts old grievances of league tables and excellence frameworks aside to tackle climate change”. You can read this here. ∫∫∫
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The Daily Mail has launched a 6 week Be a Tree Angel campaign urging its readers to plant up to a million trees across the UK. This could range from planting trees in their garden, supporting local tree-planting initiatives or donating money to fund planting projects. As part of the campaign, we are also aiming to plant 1,000 orchards in 1,000 schools. The campaign has been launched because trees can play an important role in tackling climate change, improving air quality and supporting wildlife. Also, millions of ash, oak, and horse chestnut trees are at risk.
The campaign is being launched to coincide with the start of National Tree Week, (23 Nov to 1 Dec), which is run by the Tree Council, an umbrella body including the Woodland Trust and Trees for Cities. ∫∫∫
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Greta Thunberg and George Monbiot have helped produce a short film highlighting the need to protect, restore and use nature to tackle the climate crisis. Living ecosystems like forests, mangroves, swamps and seabeds can pull enormous quantities of carbon from the air and store them safely, but natural climate solutions currently receive only 2% of the funding spent on cutting emissions. The film’s director, Tom Mustill of Gripping Films, said:
“We tried to make the film have the tiniest environmental impact possible. We took trains to Sweden to interview Greta, charged our hybrid car at George’s house, used green energy to power the edit and recycled archive footage rather than shooting new.”
The film is on YouTube. ∫∫∫
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November 19th was World Toilet Day. Currently hundreds of millions of people have to defecate in the open air. The significance of toilets is explained by sanitation expert Kate Medlicott in this live atch the video here. ∫∫∫
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Are your students clamouring for up-to-date facts on whether a meat-free died would be better for our carbon budget than an omnivorous one (and if so, by how much)? If so, then The Economist has some good graphs and data for them to tuck into. ∫∫∫
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Learning for Sustainability Scotland recently listed a couple of school resources:
1. World Rescue Game
World Rescue is a narrative, research-based video-game inspired by the Sustainable Development Goals. Through fast-paced gameplay set in Kenya, Norway, Brazil, India, and China, you will meet and help five young heroes and help them solve global problems.
2. Chain Reaction – New Song from Plastic Fantastic
A song on climate change issues ideal for school assemblies, concerts or lessons. Free of charge from the creator of Plastic Fantastic the Musical. ∫∫∫
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WWF has a feature on making palm oil production sustainable in Malaysia. ∫∫∫
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If you want your students to read about the merits of the Green New Deal, you might consult the Ecologist. If you want them to read an opposing view, then you might try the Economist. These are two good places to start in the quest for different perspectives. A good question to ask students might be whether there is any common ground in these views. ∫∫∫
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Last week we featured the latest EDS Zoom Newsletter. If you click here you can read all recent editions. ∫∫∫