Climate Canons
Plastic Free July
Plastic Free July is a global movement that helps millions of people be part of the solution to plastic pollution so we can have cleaner streets, oceans, and beautiful communities. Single-use plastic is still one of the largest volumes entering landfills, creating numerous problems. On Wednesday 31st July, the Climate Canons rewarded students who had no plastic in their lunch boxes at recess. Thank you to all those people who let us snoop in their lunch boxes and we hope people are thinking about how they can reduce their waste going to landfill.
Waste Sorted Student Meet
The Climate Canons sent 8 representatives to the annual Waste Authority’s Wastesorted Student Meet at Emmanuel Catholic College on Tuesday 6 August. This was an opportunity for like-minded students from all over Perth to come together to talk about sustainability and what schools are doing to fight the war on waste in their school.
Guest speaker Samuel Thomas runs Sam’s Spares, a 100% Volunteer-run Not-for-Profit Organisation that saves unwanted IT E-waste from landfills. Sam and his volunteer team repair and refurbish computers, laptops, mobile phones, gaming systems and other electronics and gift them Free of Charge to people in need across WA. It was an inspiration to hear him speak. Students, staff, and industry providers talked and listened, workshopped and networked ideas around the important need to manage waste better and lots of ideas were shared to improve our practices here at the College. Thank you to Mrs Kippen for driving the bus.
Clothes Swap
Our love of new clothes and our thirst for the latest fashion come at a cost to the planet. As the need to address climate change becomes ever more urgent, we need to learn about the impact our clothes have on the environment and how we can cut the carbon from our closets.
The fashion sector, including cotton farming, also uses about 93 billion cubic meters of water annually, representing 4 percent of all global freshwater withdrawal. Just to manufacture a single pair of jeans requires a staggering 3,781 litres of water. And every second of the day, the equivalent of a garbage truck full of textiles is burned or added to landfill. The main culprit is fast fashion.
Fast fashion is a term used to describe the clothing industry’s model of mass-producing clothes at low cost with high-speed turnaround times to replicate the latest streetwear and fashion trends as they appear in real-time on catwalks or on our social media feeds. This has encouraged the overconsumption of clothing over the past two decades and driven a perception that clothes are disposable items rather than durable products.
So, what can we do about this? The Climate Canons will be hosting the first clothes swap here at the College in Week 4.2. It will be an opportunity for students and staff to donate clothes that are in good condition, that you don’t wear anymore and swap them for something else that has been donated. This is a way to refresh your wardrobes sustainably. We all have the ability to be part of sustainable fashion, it may start here at the College.
If you would be interested in donating clothes to the swap, keep these tips in mind:
CHECK for damage, stains, broken zippers and buttons
ASK would we give it to a friend?
WASH the items before swapping
DONATE to the correct donation point at the College, don't dump it!
Students and Parents & Guardians, keep an eye on your direct messages from Miss Pisconeri with details about donations, date, location and cost of the event. We’d love to have the College community involved.
Miss D Pisconeri
(Humanities and Social Sciences Teacher and Climate Canons Co-ordinator)