Green Schools Campaign - Sallins National School

********
Our Second Green Flag

After an initial false start, thanks to a heavy rain shower, on Wednesday 15th June the entire school community, parents and members of the wider community gathered to raise the school's second green flag. This flag was earned after we raised awareness of energy consumption and reduced the consumption of energy in the school. Our motto for this campaign was 'Show how much we care, Save energy everywhere'. The entire green schools committee, co-ordinated by Mrs Hennessy and Ms Conway, was very active in raising awareness among pupils and staff on energy and energy conservation both in school and at home.

The junior committee members were very busy. They had to measure oil levels over time in order to calculate fuel consumption and talk to individual classes to highlight the issue of energy consumption and conservation of energy in school and at home. They also had to make announcements over the school intercom to remind pupils and staff alike to reduce energy usage.

Mr Lanigan welcomed those congregated and spoke of the co-operative effort of pupils and staff which earned us our second green flag. Three junior committee members, Searlait, Ruairí and Anna, spoke eloquently about the energy campaign and all the work that was done. Then Kevin, the school caretaker, and the junior committee members walked together holding the green flag to the flagpole. In silence the flag was raised and then there was huge applause for this great achievement. We were then so lucky to have our junior and senior infants sing 'Pick It Up', thus reminding us to keep our environment clean. After there were some refreshments for our visitors in the library.

It was an enjoyable way to finish this particular campaign and served as a reminder to keep all our energy and waste reducing schemes going. We were very lucky to get back inside before the next shower arrived! So now we have to earn our next green flag, 'Water', and there was no shortage of it on Wednesday!!!

********

Green Schools

We have been working hard to renew our ‘Litter and Waste’ green flag and towards earning our ‘Energy’ flag. We ran a whole school slogan competition to come up with a ‘Green-Code’ which would reflect our school’s commitment to environmentally friendly actions.  We are delighted with our new slogan, by Rebecca Cummins 6 th class;

Show how much we care,
Save energy everywhere.

We then ran a poster competition in school.  We asked that posters would display our new ‘Green-Code’ and that they would promote the theme of energy conservation.  Our junior winners were in first place Zoe Fitzpatrick (Junior Infants) and in 2nd place Máire Áine Ní Dhomhnaill (1st Class).  Our senior winners were Grace McAllorum (5th class) in 1st place and Aga Zajac (5th Class) in 2nd place.  We received some fantastic entries which made the committee’s decision a difficult one.  Well done to all who entered.
While we are working in school to conserve energy we would encourage you at home to consider this both for the financial benefits but also for environmental benefits.

To see our second classes working with Nuala Madigan and "Guzzler", please click here.


Check out ways to save energy at home by clicking on the link below.
www.seai.ie/Power_of_One/Energy_Saving/Top_Tips/