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Title	Environmental Action Projects for School Students - Edition 1 Index Introduction 1. Poster Campaign 2. Invite a guest speaker 3. Run an information stall at your fete 4. Run an environment day activity 5. Prepare a group to go to the environment day rally 6. Set up an environment group 7. Fund raise for the environment 8. Enrol to vote campaign 9. Conduct an energy/environment audit of your school 10. Conduct a school campaign 11. Other project ideas Help Back to the Education Campaign Page
Introduction	29th June 2004 Hi, My name is Adrian. I help run an environmental organisation called Futureenergy.org. We are campaigning to stop climate change and ensure a sustainable energy future for the world. As part of our campaign we have developed this project kit to give you some ideas on how you could go about campaigning on environment issues at your school. The projects vary from quite simple projects, to ones that are complex and would take a good deal of time to finish. Feel free to have a go at whichever project interests you, or use these ideas to make up your own. If you are having any trouble or would like to talk about any project, feel free to email me. Finally, remember it is your future that needs to be saved. Adrian Whitehead adrian@futureenergy.org Top
Project 1.	Poster Campaign 1. Choose an issue you think your fellow students and teachers should learn about. 2. Design a poster or use an existing poster made by someone else. a.In designing a poster consider the following points. i.It should attract people's attention. ii.The most important information should be easy to read from a distance. iii.All text should be readable. iv.Print on "post consumer waste recycled paper". b.Try to include a "call to action" on your poster that is relevant to your issue, such as "buy clean energy" or "refuse reflex". 3. Place these posters up around the school on notice boards. a. Consider good locations, such as where people eat, or where a lot of people walk past. b. You may need permission to use notice boards. 4. Monitor posters for 1-2 weeks, replacing those that get taken down. Special: Consider linking the poster to a guest speaker coming to talk on the issue, see Project 2. Top
Project 2.	Invite a guest speaker 1. Choose an issue you think your fellow students and teachers should learn about.mail adrian@futureenergy.org if interested. 2. Find a group that is campaigning on the issue and invite them to speak at your school.mail adrian@futureenergy.org if interested. a.Some groups, especially smaller volunteer run groups, may charge to speak to cover the costs of travel etc, though they are likely to waive costs if your school has no speaker's budget.mail adrian@futureenergy.org if interested. 3. Do you want the speaker to talk to a small group at lunch, as part of a class lesson, or to the whole school assembly? mail adrian@futureenergy.org if interested. Note: Futureenergy.org does talks for schools on energy and climate change issues. The talks are for free but a donation to cover costs is most welcome (suggested $40). Email adrian@futureenergy.org if interested. Top
Project 3.	Run an information stall at your fete Fetes are a good opportunity to show teachers, parents, and fellow students, that there are people interested in saving the environment, and to get your message out there. 1. Choose whether you want to run a general stall, or a stall on one or two issues. 2. Either way, contact different environment groups, and ask them to provide you with material for your stalls. Be persistent, as many environment groups are very under staffed and may not get back to you, other groups will be eager to help. If you are having no luck phoning, the best way to get material may be to visit each group personally. Top
Project 4.	Run an environment day activity Environment Day is on June the 5th each year. It is the day when the world should celebrate the importance of the environment, focus on what needs to be done to stop damaging it, and start repairing the damage we have already done. In 2005 Environment day is on a a Sunday. In the week leading up to World Environment Day, consider running some sort of activity. If you can't do it in the week before, do your activity the week after. This could be an environment day at your school, where you run a stall or invite a speakers or speakers to talk. You could show an environmental documentary or movie at lunch time. Perhaps you want to organise a week of activities doing something each lunch time, such as focusing on a different issue each day. Really, the sky is the limit here - worm farms on Day 1, Energy on Day 5. In 2006 Environment Day is on a Monday. Top
Project 5.	Set up an environment group Getting together a group of people who are interested in campaigning on environmental issues can be very rewarding and help achieve your goals. You will need to talk to your teachers re getting access to rooms, photocopiers, computer etc. for your group. If the teachers don't want to help, meet after school at someone's house. 1. Organise a meeting time and place. 2. Advertise that you are setting up a group to your fellow students and encourage them to come. 3. Hold your first meeting, introduce yourselves to each other, and find out what everyone's environmental interests are. 4. Decide on some projects your group would like to undertake during the year. Find out who is willing to actually do the work needed. 5. Consider how you run your meetings. Is everyone having a chance to be heard? Are you supporting people who want to take on their own projects? Is any one person dominating the meeting too much? Top
Project 6.	Prepare a group to go to the Environment Day rally On the Sunday closest to Environment day a rally and festival is held. This year (2004) a rally was held in support of stopping the destruction of Tasmanian Old Growth Forests, with around 15,000 people attending. We hope to make this an annual event for all people campaigning on the environment. 1. Organise a group from your school to go. 2. Make a banner identifying your group and your school and perhaps the environmental issues that most concern you. 3. Organise a place to meet up prior to getting to the rally with your fellow students so you can all march together. Top
Project 7.	Fund raise for the environment Saving the environment requires resources. Resources include things such as people's time, access to photo copying and computers, and money. 1. Consider running a stall, holding a raffle, holding a video night to raise money. 2. Use the money raised to run your own campaigns, or donate the money to an environmental group. The smaller the environment group, the more impact your donation will have. Top
Project 8.	Enrol to vote campaign Many of your year twelve students will turn 18 during the year. Most young people care about the environment and vote accordingly. However many people do not enrol to vote as soon as they are 18, so the vote for the environment is not as high as it could be at election time. You could run an enrol to vote campaign encouraging 18 year olds to enrol to vote as soon as they can. 1. Design your campaign. Are you going to use posters, speakers, stalls or an article in your school newsletter? How long will you run it? What resources do you need? 2. Contact the Australian or Victorian Electoral commissions. They can provide you with information about voting and enrolling to vote. Australian Electoral Commission = www.aec.gov.au Victorian Electoral Commission = www.vec.vic.gov.au 3. You could invite a person who is your local member of parliament or is from one of the political parties to talk at your school on why it is important to vote. Get them to explain how the voting system works. Do you know how the voting system works? Note: futureenergy.org has information on our web site about voting for the environment. See www.futureenergy.org/actionvote.html Top
Project 9.	Conduct an energy/environment audit of your school There are probably lots of environmental problems associated with your school. Does your school use Reflex paper made from Victoria's and Tasmania's native forests? Does your school use electricity from renewable sources or from Greenhouse-producing coal? Does your school recycle its waste? Is your school composting or does it have a worm farm? Does your school waste energy in terms of heating and lighting? Could you reduce the cost of heating and lighting enough to buy clean power for the same cost as you are buying coal power? Does your school serve healthy low sugar, low fat food? Conduct an audit, the audit may be as broad or narrow as you like. For example a total environmental audit covering energy, materials used, building design, waste and rubbish etc., or pick a single focus and, for example, just audit the type and quantity of paper your school uses. Resources Origin Energy can provide your teacher with a class curriculum kit for auditing home energy use. You could probably adapt this to audit your school. www.originenergy.com.au (see the education resource section of their website) Find out about good and bad paper - www.tcha.org.au/paper.html Report: Suggest solutions as part of your audit, i.e. use environmentally friendly paper, and present a report to your principal and your school councillors showing what you found and what you recommend. Ask them to get back to you with what they propose to do about it. If your school does not implement your solutions, consider conducting a campaign (see 10. below). Top
Project 10.	Conduct an internal school campaign So you have found out your school uses reflex paper which destroys Victorian and Tasmanian Native Forests, or your school uses coal power rather than clean power and is contributing to the Greenhouse effect, and your school doesn't want to do anything about it. Consider conducting a campaign. Bellow are some of the things you might consider doing. 1. Send your report to each member of the school council with a letter asking them why they have not supported your proposal. 2. Use projects 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 7 to educate the students, teachers and parents of your school about the issues and your solutions. 3. Write to the minister for education expressing your concerns. 4. Look at the reasons why the school council refused to do what you asked and see if you can find answers. For example if they said using "Green Power" was too expensive, find ways to save the same amount of money from your school energy bill - then they will have no excuse not to buy "Green Power". 5. Give students an information flyer or kit on the issue to take home to their parents. 6. Encourage students, teachers and parents to write to the school council and principal. 7. Run a public education campaign about what your school is doing in your local area (see "11. Other projects" project "a." below). 8. Go to the local media and tell them your story. Top
Project 11.	Other Project Ideas a. Conduct a local education campaign Maybe you want to educate your neighbourhood about an environmental issue. Consider postering, running a stall, speaker nights, or letter boxing. If letter boxing, remember don't put material in "No Junk Mail" etc. letter boxes unless your leaflets have political material/messages in them. b. Organise a school excursion Go on a trip to the forests and see logging destruction first hand, or visit a place like CERES. CERES stands for the Centre for Education and Research in Environment Strategies. The Park features community gardens, a permaculture and bush food nursery, an animal farm, energy efficient house, composting systems, the Greenhouse Trail, the Waste Water Trail and more. Up to 60,000 school students visit each year. See www.ceres.org.au c. Lunch Time Stalls Run a lunch time stall. Consider combining this with a letter writing campaign, or petition (see e. and f. below). d. Get a better environmental curriculum Perhaps your school is not teaching enough about the environment. Consider lobbying for more and better environmental material in your school curriculum. e. Letter writing campaign Start a letter writing campaign on an issue that concerns you. Encourage students, teachers and parents to write letters. Where to send letters can include the newspapers (Age, Herald Sun, Australian and Local), your local politician (Federal and State), the Minister for the Environment (State and Federal), the Prime Minster, the Premier, or the opposition. f. Petition Start collecting petitions on an issue that concerns you. When you think you have enough (the more the better), organise to present the petitions to your local politician (Federal or State), the Minister for the Environment (State or Federal), the Prime Minster or the Premier. g. Media When doing any activity invite the local newspaper or radio station along. h. Conduct a local election campaign Consider supporting an environment friendly party or candidate. Run a public education campaign (see a. above) or ring the party or candidate and offer your support. Top
Help	Need help? Any questions please contact myself (adrian) by emailing me at adrian@futureenergy.org. In your interested in helping stop climate change and ensure a sustainable energy future, Futureenergy.org would love your support. Top

Last Updated: 11/9/04 by @1