Eco Week: empowering our pupils to be agents of change in creating a greener world

Our pupil-led Green Committee are focusing their efforts this term on sustainability. We have issued a survey to all Bryanston staff and pupils in order to examine attitudes towards sustainability in the lead up to Bryanston’s Eco Week (March 2023). The findings of the survey will help identify priorities and assist with planning for the future. Approximately 400 responses to the survey were received in total and these will be used to focus the future work of the Green Committee.

Eco Week this year had a theme of waste. A whole school assembly focused on clothing waste and a special D year assembly covered waste in general, including food and energy. Many departments participated in using the climate crisis as a cross-curricular theme for teaching. For example, our History Department drew comparisons between the Suffragettes and Extinction Rebellion, whilst our Language Department looked at vocabulary related to sustainability. Our English Department studied poetry and nature and our Maths Department set assignments with problems based on the climate crisis, such as our C pupils calculating percentage change in Arctic Sea ice and A2 pupils modelling city emission levels and using vectors to describe the behaviour of hurricanes. And finally, our Latin Department considered Virgil’s poems from an eco-critical perspective.

During Eco Week our pupils organised a Clothes Exchange, a ‘Meat Free Monday’ which included delicious plant-based food prepared by the Catering Department, and an energy competition was organised. The friendly inter-house energy saving competition was won by Allan, who saved 8% on their previous week’s consumption. As their prize, they will receive a visit later this term by our Catering Van.

Pupils also appeared on BryRadio, Bryanston’s very own radio station, to encourage lively debate and discussion with teachers about ways to be more sustainable whilst the Library promote a special focus on eco-literature.