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Sustainable kids building a sustainable future
Rhode Street Primary School’s new commercial kitchen where the children make
healthy meals from their own fresh produce. Photos: Rhode Street Primary School
Children from Rhode Street Primary School in Hamilton are teaching the community lessons on sustainability from outside the classroom.
The Rhode Street School mission statement says the school “aims to provide for the needs of all our children by giving them opportunities to develop their potential in a caring environment”. But the school goes one step further by encouraging its pupils to also care for the environment as part of its after school Sustainable Kids programme.
The Sustainable Kids programme began thanks to funding from the Ministry of Social Development with the aim of giving more to children in after school care. The school built a commercial kitchen over the Christmas break last year with help from the fund and converted the old school pool into a full blown hydroponic nursery.
The old school pool has been
converted into a hydroponic
nursery. Photos: Rhode Street
Primary School
Vegetables and flowers are plentiful in and around the school making it both a colourful and important learning environment. The children are now learning how to make healthy meals and preserves from their own fresh produce during after school care.
“All the children throughout the school are involved in planting gardens, garden maintenance, recycling, reusing and being sustainable,” says the school’s extended services co-ordinator Delwyn Rouse.
The benefits are proving to be big. Despite so many parents working full time the school children aren't missing out, learning to grow and cook food they may never have otherwise tasted. The rest of the community gets to appreciate the children’s fun and environmentally friendly activities too because they are now selling their school-made produce.
“We have had lots of publicity and we have had lots of visitors. The support and encouragement has been great,” says Rouse.
So what’s in store for the future of the Sustainable Kids programme? At the moment the children are working towards incorporating more sustainable initiatives into the programme and are hoping to develop a supply of healthy lunches to go into local schools. The school council even wants to build a 200 seat café for the children to sit in.
Students take pride in making
a difference to the environment
and learning new skills.
Photos:
Rhode Street Primary School
Rhode Street School is just one of the 608 Enviroschools scattered around New Zealand. The Enviroschools programme was developed in the Waikato in the early 1990s and has been successful in educating more than 195,000 children each year about developing eco-habits for a sustainable future.
“Kids learn by doing. And if they're excited by what they're doing, they're going to remember what they've learnt,” says Rhode Street School principal Shane Ngata.
By helping to create a tangible learning environment for children, schools like Rhode Street Primary are demonstrating that the challenge of environmental sustainability can be met by the right people who have the right will. Our young people play a crucial role in protecting and caring for our environment now and for generations to come, so it is important that we foster their interest, their learning and their appreciation of the balance people and the environment have with each other.
For more information on Enviroschools visit www.enviroschools.org.nz
