Holy Rosary Catholic School in Wyoming, Ontario recently became certified with the Ontario EcoSchools program and it is having a tremendous impact on the way students view the environment.
“I would say our students are much more aware of the world around them and the ways in which our lives affect the planet,” says Margaret DeGurse, Principal of Holy Rosary Catholic School. “They have become environmental stewardship leaders – not just at school, but at home and in our community, too!”
Holy Rosary became involved in the EcoSchools program through the St. Clair Catholic District School Board’s Chatham-Kent Lambton Administrative School Services (CLASS). With the support of CLASS, resources from Ontario EcoSchools and funding from the Council of Directors of Education (CODE), Holy Rosary’s drive towards certification was launched.
“The students and staff at Holy Rosary embraced the concept of EcoSchools from the beginning,” says Willy Wong, Energy and Environmental Services Coordinator with CLASS. “It was fun to watch the program take off!”
The school has embarked on several major initiatives as part of the certification process. Reducing waste has been a key focus for students. Through composting, recycling, reusing and repairing the school has cut its garbage output from seven bags a day to just one. Parents also report that their children are requesting changes at home – including the purchase of reusable containers rather than disposable sandwich bags.
Students from Kindergarten to Grade 8 are participating in a composting program, in which both traditional and vermicomposting methods are used. Students know and understand how composting works and its importance in the ecosystem. Even the youngest students have been overheard to say, “If you put plastic in the compost, you won’t have rich dirt!” Grade 1 and 2 students, with the support of custodian Brian Kershaw, are the supervisors of the vermicomposter and have taught older students how to feed and care for the worms.
“It has been fantastic to see how much our students have learned,” says Mrs. DeGurse.
The EcoSchools program has also encouraged the school’s environmental outreach to the community. Holy Rosary is also a ‘WE School’ and students have been collecting old used batteries as part of the Teck Zinc Saves Lives Battery Recycling Campaign. As a result, local residents and business owners have started to drop batteries off at the school, so that they won’t go to the local landfill. In just two months, the school has collected nearly 60 pounds of used batteries.
Amy Chiasson’s Grade 5/6 class at Holy Rosary Catholic School has also established a partnership with Heaven’s Wildlife Rescue, a local volunteer-based organization that cares for sick, injured, orphaned or displaced native Ontario wildlife, with the ultimate goal of returning them back to the wild. Rileigh Helps and Gabbi Sullivan, two students from the class, spearheaded a bake sale and movie night fundraiser. Tom Moore, a Holy Rosary parent and Heaven’s Wildlife Rescue volunteer brought some rescued animals to the event, so that students and parents alike could see them and have a greater appreciation for what they were supporting. The successful event raised $450 for the organization!
“Becoming involved in the EcoSchools program has made teaching and learning about the environment such a natural part of our school day,” says Mrs. DeGurse. “It has become very easy to embed the principles of environmental stewardship in our day-to-day conversations.”
At the beginning of the process to obtain certification, each class was assigned the task of researching and writing facts about the environment for one month; and each morning, one of those facts was read during the school’s morning announcements. One fact that particularly resonated with the students was learning that, as inhabitants of the planet, we have created 80 percent of the world’s pollution in just the last 100 years.
“That made our students really start to think about what we need to do to take care of the earth,” says Mrs. DeGurse. “They learned that environmental stewardship is something that we need to do every day, not just during a special event once in a while. It’s a shift in attitude and we’ve already seen how these young ambassadors are influencing, not just what we do at school, but also at home and here in the Village of Wyoming.”
Ella Arsenault is a Grade 6 student at Holy Rosary, who loves to spread the word about environmental stewardship. “Being an EcoSchool is fun because we get to teach each other about how to help the world, and that’s important because we’ve messed it up a bit. We can also go home and tell our parents about it!”
Kindergarten teacher Katie Haggart says the students are comfortable in sharing their knowledge across grades, classrooms and even with other schools. “We have developed a much stronger sense of community through sharing our learning about EcoSchools, the environment and stewardship,” says Ms. Haggart.
“I want to congratulate the students and staff at Holy Rosary for their great work and for achieving this important designation,” says Deb Crawford, Director of Education. “It will be important for them to share what they have learned across the system so that more students can grow in environmental leadership and more St. Clair Catholic district schools can become EcoSchools. What an exciting future for our Board and for our communities!”
Holy Rosary Catholic School officially received the EcoSchools certification in June.
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