Project Ideas
Many schools, groups and individuals are taking positive action to contribute toward a sustainable future.
Ideas for consideration include:
Students For Environmental Action combined several of these ideas when they set up an
indigenous plant nursery at Torquay Primary School. Other examples include the
Collingwood College Kitchen Garden,
and Schools For a Sustainable Future.
Environmental Action
Develop and/or participate in projects such as:
- revegetation and/or seed collection and propagation of local plants*
- land management
- recycling
- energy saving
- forming or working with local Action groups, and/or joining an established program such as Landcare,
Saltwatch and Waterwatch (visit Links page for details)
- gardening, using composting and/or worm-farming for soil improvement
- building and maintaining a 'no-dig' garden*
- food production using permaculture or hydroponics.
(*See the Future Harvest Education Kit for full instruction. Other activities detailed
in the kit also provide a context for taking action.)
Community Awareness
Raise awareness of sustainability in your local community by presenting issues in:
An established program can be joined:
- drama performance or musical play
- radio broadcast
- video
- school environmental festival
- environmental publications (flyer, newspaper, magazine)
- art / craft presentations
- photographic exhibition
Promoting Sustainable Practices
Develop a strategy to implement a new school or community initiative. Projects may focus on recycling, ground
beautification, energy use, composting organic waste or developing a worm farm.
The strategy should:
- have achievable aims and justification for implementation
- include the resources required (including possible funding)
- propose a timeline
- include marketing the initiative to students and staff (as part of a school policy), and/or to stakeholders
in the community
- involve key people from the school or community.
The completed strategy should be presented at an appropriate forum such as school assembly, staff meeting and Student
Council. If desired, the wider community could be involved. The strategy could be presented to people 'outside' the
project, for example, other schools, local Rotary chapters, local conservation groups and community radio programs.
An environmental survey to investigate environmental practices used within the school is a good place to begin. An
example of a School Environmental Survey sheet can be found in the Education Kit. Groups can
be allocated a specific area to investigate and report their findings, discuss the benefits of practices that are
implemented, and reasons why others are not.
Land Management Issues
It is important that people are in a position to make informed decisions, learn how to cooperate with others and become
active in the community. Many significant changes occur at a local level first.
Find out about issues in your area:
- contact local authorities to develop a list of current land management issues in your area
- discuss and prepare preliminary reports on possible solutions for these issues
- find out more - copies of relevant reports may be available at your regional library, or online at local
government or other websites
- invite speakers to talk about local issues and how a group may be formed to address local issues identified in
preliminary reports
- work with a local Landcare, Parks Conservation group or farmer for a day to take direct action, eg tree
planting.
Become actively involved through the organisation of a group or campaign.
