NEST News
NEST 2020 Learning Story
2020 has been a tough year for the school’s largest student-run club. Not being able to physically meet forced us to halt many of our big projects, but here we would like to celebrate the achievements of the club and what the hard work of all our dedicated NEST members has led us to accomplish in 2020. Summit planning was able to achieve their goal once again of spreading awareness around certain sustainability issues. Green team did exceptionally well to help improve the school’s biodiversity, and Resource-Smart helped reduce the energy costs of the school, the group’s biggest aim this year.
What did Resource-Smart do?
At the beginning of 2020, members of Resource Smart attended a staff meeting to discuss with the teachers and staff about being conscious of energy usage during and after class. Further to this, we planned earth hour and an energy audit to reduce our energy consumption as a school. However, due to COVID-19, this did not go to plan as our whole school transitioned into online learning. Despite the challenges we faced this year, as a collective group Resource Smart took advantage of the online learning environment by creating digital posters to alert students and staff about their energy usage both at home and at school. The reminders included to turn off lights, turn off fans/air conditioners/heaters, turn off projectors/other technological equipment, etc. These posters were featured on teams (our school communication platform) and were sent out to the community.
Casey Environmental Summit
Our Summit-Planning team organised their first Zoom environmental summit in Term 3, replacing the normal annual summit held at the school physically. The summit consisted of fun, educational activities, including groups working together to design a shelter for a given natural disaster. There was a ‘Spectrum’ segment, in which students debated matters such as whether they were hopeful about Australia’s climate future. Panelists Sam Galvin, Mandy Robertson (Dolphin Research Institute) and Deb Anderson (a journalist), kindly took part in the Q&A exploring today’s environmental issues.
Remember Our Annual NEST Bake Sale?
Early this year, NEST members put on their chef hats and baked dozens of brownies, cookies and cupcakes of varying sizes. It was a huge success at the swimming carnival, as over $500 was raised! All proceeds went to bushfire relief.
Green Team
Over the course of 2020, the Green Team proactively worked on their main goal for the year - revitalising the school’s abandoned veggie garden. After lots of hard work and hours of decision making and application processes, the team was able to secure a $4000 grant from the City of Casey in order to convert the unused veggie patch into an indigenous garden which will celebrate the native plant species of the local area, and the artwork of the traditional owners of the land our school is situated on. The team hopes to start working on the garden as soon as possible after school returns to normal functioning.
Hopefully, under full function next year, the club will be able to continue at full speed, aiming to accomplish more than ever before under the 2021 NEST leaders and our passionate group of members.
Jessica Nguyen, Hamza Ahmed, Zarin Binte Zoha and Prathiksha Ashok Raj Kumar
Nest Team
