Today’s Senior School Morning Talk was given by Diane from Transition Town Letchworth, who was invited to speak by St Chris student Gianni, Major Official responsible for environmental matters as Chair of the Be Green Committee.
Transition Town Letchworth are campaigning for the town to be recognised as Plastic Free by reducing single-use plastics in households, businesses and organisations.
The group has five objectives:
1) To work with local government, the Council and the Letchworth Heritage Foundation to use less plastic on their premises and within their initiatives.
2) To encourage 12 local businesses to pledge to reduce single-use plastics, specifically swapping three things they regularly use for non-plastic alternatives. Currently, six businesses have signed up.
3) To work with local allies to reduce plastic including 30% of local schools and 50% of community spaces and organisations, for example, local parks, Scout and Guide troops, community centres etc.
4) To attend rallies to increase public awareness. At an event in the town centre on 21 May they encouraged 74 people to pledge to reduce their use of plastics including local Member of Parliament Sir Oliver Heald.
5) To set up a cross-organisational steering group with local government and businesses to drive change.
Upcoming activities include a screening of A Plastic Ocean at the Broadway Cinema in Letchworth on 19 June and, this year’s Letchworth Festival art competition, the theme of which is ‘Plastic Free’.
As Chair of Be Green, Gianni is leading the School’s response to this initiative, running a forthcoming trip to the zero-waste shop Bamboo Turtle in Letchworth on 11 May, working with staff and students to respond to the challenge of reducing single-use plastics, and building a Zen Garden as part of our upcoming Options Programme.
This follows another recent Option where students from Year 9 and year 10 surveyed the School to help develop a plan to reduce plastic use within the School, and wrote to MP Sir Oliver Heald, asking him to support reducing plastic waste within Parliament and through government initiatives, to which the students received a very positive response.
Further updates to follow!
For more information about Transition Town Letchworth visit their website here.
