School Targets
These three current targets, identified by Eco Club, will be the focus of school changes this year.
Recycling
We are really motivated to make a big impact with our recycling. We have been collecting hard plastics, including pens and glue sticks. We have managed to recycle over 4000 pens and glue sticks so far! In addition, we have stepped up the food waste recycling within the school kitchen and have a new compost bin in the playground for food waste from children's healthy snacks and garden waste. As we get more proficient with recycling, we hope to develop a wider range of materials that we can recycle.
The School Environment.
We are working hard to improve the school environment by focusing on the fauna within the school site. Several plant donations have been made to our ‘quiet area’ which continues to develop and thrive. Thank you to all stakeholders who have donated plants to Ashton Gate Primary. In addition, we have been working with The woodland trust and their Trees for Schools officer – Jon Atwood. We have been able to plant 30 saplings on the school grounds and are monitoring their progress. The PTA have also planted a number of climbing plants by the fence next to the car park in the playground, which should completely cover it when fully grown.
We have working as a school to improve the traffic congestion and road safely around both sites. You may have seen our new road signs which are helping to reduce congestion and improve road safely at the beginning and end of each day. We are hoping to continue to promote this as well as working on improving the air quality around the local area.
The Eco Reps have also been volunteering to litter-pick during their playtimes, to help reduce litter in the playground. The school also ran a 'Community Clean-Up' weekend, to help reduce litter in the local area.
Recently we have partnered up with Bristol Bites Back Better. We have received seedling donations from Blaise Nurseries, which we have now planted out into our Upton allotment site. We will be growing these vegetables on our school site and then donating these back to the local community. The Year 6 gardening club will be helping with this wonderful project.
The Bio-diversity of Ashton Gate
We are planning on making the school environment more welcoming to a variety of wildlife and encouraging wildlife to settle throughout the school grounds. We have planted many more plants in our allotment areas and are leaving some unmown and wild areas as habitats for minibeasts. We have carried out some surveys of our playground and are really pleased with the number of different invertebrates we have managed to find.
This year, we will have a big push on gardening, to help get more plants in the school playgrounds, encouraging more bees and butterflies, as well as other animals. We hope to introduce bug hotels and bird boxes in the future.