9 March 2021

By Nicole Sadler

The annual School Clean Up Day is always an opportunity to take stock of the amount of landfill waste that magically appears to be floating around school grounds.

This year the St Mary MacKillop senior environmental team suggested the senior students could work with their Prep buddies to pick up litter around the school grounds and entrance.

The litter collection was organised by Mrs Sadler, Science and Sustainability Leader at St Mary MacKillop Catholic Primary School, Bannockburn, and was supported by the Prep and Year 5/6 teachers.

Students collected a total of 10 compostable bags full of small pieces of landfill waste.

The Year 1/2 students also participated in the day by launching a ‘Plastic Bottle Lid Collection Program’. The students created colourful advertising posters to explain their intention to collect plastic bottle lids from all school families so that they can send them to a recycling facility to create new products.

The Year 3/4 students will carry out a litter collection at the local nature reserve in the coming week.

2021 School Clean Up Day was an opportunity for the whole school to reflect on how small actions can have a bigger environmental impact.

Year 5/6 environmental team member, Hamish, reflected: ‘The rubbish that we don’t collect and that goes into our school drains is the same rubbish that we can see affecting the dolphins in Port Phillip Bay.’

St Mary MacKillop Catholic Primary School is a ResourceSmart School working towards ‘Waste Module’ accreditation in 2021.