COOMBESHEAD College, Newton Abbot, is one of a growing number of schools which has decided to green up its act. The school has registered with Eco-Schools, a European environmental award programme which encourage young people to get involved and make changes within their schools. Pupil committees have been set up to look at water, waste, energy, litter, transport, healthy living, school grounds, biodiversity and global diversity. The prize is the green flag, which design and technology teacher, Lesley Ewings, hopes can become the latest must-have logo that pupils can wear on their school uniform. 'At the moment our priority is to try and get more interest by doing some assemblies and running a competition. We'd like to create a sweat shirt and logo to get the students interested so it is something trendy.' Making eco-friendly behaviour fashionable has also been identified as a high priority by the Year 10 eco-schools committee. Members are planning to dress up as trees to try to grab attention. 'We are going to try to make our school a better place and make school children aware of how much they are wasting,' said Paige Bassett, 15. One area identified for immediate attention is paper. White paper recycling bins have been set up some classrooms. So far three wheelie bins have been diverted from landfill but science teacher Claire Cook says they can do more. One simple way of saving paper is to get students to save IT documents to computer rather than printing out paper copies. 'The printer is slow so the kids get impatient and print multi-copies, then the printer gets jammed up. That lesson ends and for an hour afterwards you get reams and reams of paper coming out,' said Ms Cook. The school recently launched a carbon reduction project in conjunction with the charity Sustainable South West. It has set itself the ambitious target of reducing its carbon footprint by 20 per cent. A parallel committee of teachers has been set up to look at how the school can achieve that. Easiest things to target are waste: boosting recycling: cans, cardboard. It is not rocket science but it all takes organising. Next the committee hopes to recycle batteries and to set up its own compost heap for kitchen waste. The school has called in South West Water, to identify leaks. Ms Cook said that there is a lot of old pipework which needs replacing but a quick way to save water is to put two-litre drinks cartons into toilet cisterns, to reduce the amount they use. A group of pupils have been formed into Science Leaders with the task of researching bigger projects, such as switching to green electricity and looking into installing turbines and solar panels to heat the swimming pool. Having spent a good half-hour picking sandwiches, rubber bands and all sorts from the paper-only bins, Ms Ewings says they have a long way to go. 'I don't think people are anywhere as au fait as they should be. 'We need to find ways to get the message across in the right way,' she said.
