Environment Team

Murnong Patch Working Bee  

 On Saturday the 17 of May, we held MGC’s monthly working bee.  

We were lucky enough to be joined by the Australian Conservation Foundation, the Wattle team, and our very own local MP Gabrielle de Vietri, as well as our fantastic students and community members.  

In spite of the weather, we had a super productive session. Most of us worked on removing weeds and rubbish, whereas others worked on restoring vegetation and improving the landscape.  

After all our hard work, we finished with tea, and a range of baked goods for everyone.  

As we discussed on the day, a huge reason as to why we host these working bees is working towards the restoration of Wurundjeri land. Since colonisation, invasive weeds and urbanisation have damaged the habitats’ vegetation and biodiversity. MGCs’ Yarra bank is a significant site to traditional owners, and our monthly working bee is just one of MGCs’ many initiatives that aim to acknowledge the enduring presence, and culture of Indigenous communities. 

Our next session will be on the 21st of June from 9:00am - 11:00am at MGC, so if you are looking to be involved in a short, communal, and rewarding volunteering experience, this one’s for you! 

Maddie van Vliet 

Year 12

The Power of Activism 

Melbourne Girls College is proud to be 1 of 7 schools selected from around Australia to take part in the documentary THE POWER OF ACTIVISM’s educational impact strategy. This powerful film shines a positive light on a group of young Australians making a difference around the world engaging and inspiring communities to  Get Involved !  Creator/Producer Michelle Dado-Millynn is providing a free, unique and exclusive learning program in QLD, NSW, VIC, TAS, SA and WA. 

Our student-run project and subsequent short film ‘Accelerate’ documents the behind-the-scenes of MGC’s annual sustainability event, the Pedal Power Cinema and is inspired by the film The Power of Activism.  

In our 5 minute mini documentary, we wanted to show how an event like the Pedal Power Cinema can teach people that activism can be exciting, welcoming, community-building and most of all – fun !  RIght now, political and social change can feel really scary. The Pedal Power Cinema brings students, families and communities together all in the name of doing good for our planet with students tangibly seeing the fruits of their labour ; powering the big screen !  It shows us that we don’t exist in a vacuum, that small people can exact big change - and that’s what we wanted to show in our film.  

We have to give a big thank you to the local business owners such as Walk Talk Swim Birrarung, (screen comp), the Deputy Mayor, Sarah McKenzie who let us film and interview her for this project and countless others. Thank you also to Michelle, our advisor, and Mr. Vance, our teacher, who put us onto the project.  

You can see our film ‘Accelerate’ and ‘The Power Of Activism’ screening together at Melbourne Girls’ College in July this year: Watch this space for more details! 

Sammy Webber, Chloe Dupeux, Jay Castaldo and Neesha Sacket 

A Note on Waste 

Dear MGC Community: 

Did you know that our school is built on landfill? Pretty amazing to think that such a beautiful site was once a dumping ground! We are on a journey to switch our environmental impact from a negative to positive one. One of the ways we are trying to do this is by reducing the amount of waste that we send to landfill.  

In the past, burying our waste was less of an issue. Much of the packaging that products came in was biodegradable; paper, tin cans or aluminium foil. With the rapid developments of plastic packaging that has helped to preserve our food or keep our deliveries safe in transit, much of the packaging that our consumables come wrapped in these days will simply not degrade fast enough. Rather than breaking down in the soil, they sit in landfill, with many products releasing toxins into the environment. This also happens when they are left strewn across the yard after a lazy lunch, inevitably getting blown into the river, or escaping from the rubbish truck enroute to the tip. 

We must act as a society to stop this problem that will just not go away. 

What are we doing at MGC? 

Thanks to a generous donation from the MGC Parents Association, we now have a new fleet of waste stations that are helping our staff and students sort their waste on site. 

We also continue to promote our Solar Cone Composters located at convenient locations all around the school grounds. These wonderful digestors-of-organic-materials can handle all sorts of food scraps (INCLUDING meat, bread and dairy that our worms refuse to consider) and they also can digest all the biodegradable packaging that our wonderful friends at the school Canteen, Bocca Foods, produce. There’s simply no excuse to be putting any food scraps into landfill at MGC! 

If you’re stuck for ideas, Sustainability Victoria provides this quick reference guide on how Victorians can reducing their packaging 

How can you help? 

MGC recently registered to be a donation partner with the Victorian Container Deposit Scheme. That means that anyone in Victoria can choose to donate their CDS refund to MGC, which we will use to improve our recycling infrastructure even more! 

To use the CDS system, simply search for MGC on the reverse vending machine or drop off location when you take your next collection of containers to be recycled. Our donation partner  

ID number is: 

But you don’t need the number, you can simply type in Melbourne Girls’ College on the screen and select us to transfer your donation. 

Let’s all do our part in creating positive environmental impacts in our local community.  

Thanks for your support!