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This project examined the Daddy Long Legs (Crane Fly) insect in the local environment. They commenced the project in October 2012 and completed it in February 2013. During this time they planned their project, designed a timetable, completed the tasks on the timetable and presented the project to other pupils in their school. To complete the tasks, each member of the class participated in investigations. Findings and conclusions: This project was the culmination of considerable group work on the investigations into the Daddy Long Legs insect, The pupils examined a number of sources of information including an internet and library search, information request from relevant organisations, a field trip and peer group research. The pupils also spent time creating their own model Daddy Long Legs. Having gathered information from varied sources the pupils came to many conclusions: Larvae are valuable to soil, how to find evidence of Daddy Long Legs, what harms Daddy long Legs and that and that no information is available on Daddy Long Legs numbers in Ireland. They also made sculptures of Daddy long legs to highlight their project. 

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For their project, the group decided to develop a greenhouse to help the environment. They built the greenhouse out of wasted bottles and are collecting rain water to water the plant in the greenhouse. They also put up posters around their school to show how reduce, reuse, recycle. The greenhouse now grows garlic, pea shoots, carrots, beans and basil. 

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This project was the basis for encouraging more pupils, their friends and families to cycle to school. The project focused on the environmental and social impact of cycling. The school had a huge number of parents driving their children to school which meant congestion and a lot of unwanted CO2 in the air around the school community. After conducting a survey on the distance and time taken to cycle from each child’s home, it was clear that many students, particularly those in the senior classes, could make more of an effort to cycle. Students who cycled received a reward each week and the class who had the most cyclists were praised at a whole school assembly and given the ‘golden bike’ for 2 weeks. There have been many achievements as a result of the project. The group reached a 10% increase in cyclists in most classes. The biggest increase has been in the senior classes which was what they were aiming for. 

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This project concerns raising awareness of the need to have a healthy lunch, so that there are healthy people in a healthy environment. The groups aimed to promote ‘A healthy school lunch sets up good habits for life, it helps concentration and gives the best opportunities in the day’. Sometimes younger students needed encouragement to eat well and a cleverly designed lunchbox could help with that. Lunchboxes are better for the environment because people re-use the same lunchbox. They choose to reduce, reuse, recycle and eat local, eat in season and eat fresh.

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Planet Pals are a group of four girls who want to make a difference. Together they created Planet Pals, an environmental group in their school to address the hopes we all have for our future and provide a real understanding of how we can all make a difference. Their aim is simple. To foster, respect and compassion for our planet and to inspire each individual to action, to make our world a much better place for us all to live in. Planet Pals have gone from a simple vision to strength and unity of an ever growing number of teachers, children and members of their community. They learn, inform and inspire with their presentations, competitions and fun crafts activities. They have their own logo, pamphlets, posters and distribute their newsletter throught their school. They regularly contact industry professionals including Carlow Council and have displayed their information books in the local library. Teachers use their 2D and 3D displays and they are featured on their school web site and are getting their own web  page. They began by asking children to tell them what they wanted for their future. From this they put together their Back to Basics themes such as renewable energy, the green outdoors,  energy conservation and recycling .Their activities are planned around these themes. Planet Pals run competitions, fun crafts events and write humorous poems about renewable energy which have been featured in the local newspaper. Planet Pals invite guest speakers and every day choose two litter pickers to pick litter up around the school, carry out surveys, run book swap days, run recycling competitions and have also set up an energy patrol.

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This group carried out research and investigations on varying environmental issues. They began by brainstorming the idea of the environment and what it really means. As they had a large class, they broke into six small groups. Six topics were chosen for each group which included: Non-renewable sources of energy and renewable sources of energy. As renewable energy is such a vast field, two groups were assigned to tackle this topic. Each group was given two weeks to research their particular area and to carry out experiments specific to their field.Group 1 carried out a survey on the pupil’s knowledge on environmental issues at the school. Group 2 invited a guest speaker to come to the school and talk about renewable energy. Group 3 investigated the water usage of their school and looked at some water saving measures that they could take on. Group 4 organized a community clean-up encouraging all 4th class students to participate. Group 5 investigated the ways in which they could reduce, reuse and recycle. Group 6 researched and investigated the benefits of composting and created and took care of a wormery. Once the research and experiments were complete, a two-day presentation of all the students’ work was presented to the school. The presentation was both visual and interactive and engaged approximately 500 boys and girls. Throughout the research, computer and communication skills were developed. Since completing the project the school has been in contact with other organisations such as Tidy Towns and are planning on a sea shore clean up. 

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This project involved designing a creative sculpture, collecting materials (at no cost) and creating a sculpture to highlight environmental issues. The group also researched and promoted reducing home waste, recycling and reusing, at home, in the local community and in the school. They presented their sculpture to the adjoining special school with the aim of helping other pupil’s imaginations and creativity grow and develop. The project has achieved a positive growth of recycling within the school and an even better attitude to accompany it. True dedication was shown throughout the entire project. 

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This project is made up of 3 parts:

1. As a result of a move to a new school and a change of uniform, SN Padraig Naofa’s old uniforms were not being used. The group came up with the idea to gather all their old tracksuits and uniforms and send them on to a developing country where children need uniforms. While researching the options on recycling the uniforms, a connection was made with a fundraiser for Varanasi Children’s hospital in India and with the Chernobyl Children’s fund. The group collected enough recycled uniforms for 200 children. The uniforms were transported in a 4 day round trip to Belarus and from there to the children. 

2. A speaker from the Varanasi Children’s hospital fund spoke to the school about India and how they recycle over there. The group fundraised for a school class room in India €292.85. They also surveyed the neighbourhood to see the levels of recycling of old clothes. They organised a clothing collection and sold the clothes to a recycling company Lemac, using the funds for the class room in India.

3. The group started a button collection to send with their contact to India. When researching about India, its recycling and culture, the group learned that a lot of Indian families make their own clothes and that reused buttons could help. 

70 children were directly involved in the project with the addition of 3 local schools and the local community.

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This group examined the effect of tobacco on living things. They conducted research into the history of tobacco smoking, what tobacco and nicotine are, smoking legislation around the globe and the cost of smoking. For their project they carried out a number of experiments, conducted a survey and produced a short animated film to demonstrate their findings. They then set out to get their message out to their local and online community. The group showed that tobacco smoking adversely affects living things and that 34% of the people they surveyed, smoked. Their message is that smoking adversely affects living things especially humans and that if you don’t smoke- don’t start and that if you do, stop!  They were successful in getting this message out to their local and online community through word of mouth, the local newspapers, the local radio station, a leaflet and a website.

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Last year, this group carried out a project focused on carbon pollution and the different ways to reduce carbon footprints, both as individuals and as a school. With the whole theme of energy efficiency in mind, the group decided to further develop their ideas from last year and chose light as their central theme for 2013. The group identified various types of lighting that are currently used in homes throughout their community. They used an electrical usage monitor to measure the amount of electricity used by the different types of bulbs. Once the most efficient bulb had been identified, they set about designing lamps that they could use at home. In doing this, the aimed to reduce the electrical usage in all homes, thus providing a more energy efficient and environmentally aware source of lighting. The group also designed a survey that could be used by visitors to the school in order to highlight the amount of energy and money that could be saved by more efficient forms of lighting. 

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The project primarily looks at the decline of bee numbers in Northern Ireland, Ireland and indeed worldwide. The group researched the most recent statistics and the causes of this decline in bee population. The group examined the importance of bees in their role as pollinators of most of the plant based foods we all eat. The group invited speakers to the school, one a local bee keeper who has hives located in the wild in close proximity to the school. He was able to explain the life cycle of the bee, how honey is produced and the wide range of plants that bee populations depend on. They also worked closely with the staff from Oxford Island Nature Reserve, who visited their group to focus on the life of local bees. Having learned about the important role of bees in the ecosystem, the causes of the decline in their numbers and the need to reverse this decline, the group have worked hard to improve the biodiversity of their school grounds and their gardens to help bees. They have made bee boxes to provide nesting for winter bees, planted bulbs, created a herb wheel  and are planting a range of bee friendly shrubs in the near future. They have published their work by making posters, putting an article in the newspaper and distributing an information leaflet to parents. They are now keen to educate people about the need to protect all the bees.

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The pupils of the Central School, Castleblayney, completed a project on energy. Initially they researched and identified the main types of energy use in their school. The energy bills for the school were used to determine how much energy has been used in the past. The children made a scaled drawing of the school and identified areas where energy was saved and areas where a lot of energy was being used. Posters were made and displayed throughout the school to remind everyone to save energy. Additional posters were made and sent to Marron’s Toyota Garage, Castleblayney, so that the wider community would be aware of the importance of saving energy. A ‘green team’ and a ‘switch squad’ were also developed in the school and now each week, four different pupils are selected to be on the sqad. In order to monitor the amount of electricity and oil used each week, the pupils took readings every Monday and Friday during October and November. The pupils also addressed the issue of food miles and how they affect the environment. The importance of buying local produce was discussed and to reinforce this, a fruit and vegetable garden was developed at the school. The idea of growing you own was also reinforced by sending a selection of vegetables, which were grown in the school garden, home to each family. The children also enjoyed using old items of clothing to create two scarecrows for the school garden.  The pupils wrote an energy song. The song ‘One Thing’ by One Direction was chosen.  The group also conducted a survey which identified measures that would reduce each family’s energy consumption. A number of tips for saving energy were found and the children used the key ones to make a fridge magnet for each family.

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This group wanted to make the local town safer for the whole community. They wanted more students to choose walking or cycling over getting a lift to school. They group also researched the environmental benefits of having a pedestrian crossing and organised a petition, signed by the local community, to get a pedestrian crossing in the village. They then wrote to the local council with their petition and request for a pedestrian crossing in the centre of the town. Barry Keating and Councillor Michael Higgins replied to their letter and informed the group that Ennistymon have been allocated 30,000 Euro for a pedestrian crossing in 2013. The group also held a bicycle fixing training workshop and had a demonstration on environmental friendly cars such as the Nissan Leaf and the Toyota Prius. They publicised and ran a Cycle and Walk to School day last year (2012) and will hold another this year (2013). The group secured an environmental workshop for the TY students and everyone explored various environmental issues. 

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This group focused on cycling as it is a very popular activity in their school.  There was such a demand for cycling in the school that they set up a cycling club. However, there was nowhere on school grounds that they could store their bikes safely so they got in contact with some local organisations for assistance.  In conjunction with Sligo County Council and a lot of hard work, the group were provided with a €3000 grant enabling them to purchase a bike rack for the whole school community. The aim for young environmentalist project was to raise awareness of cycling, not only in their school but also in the local community. In their school they held a bike awareness day where they had a cake sale where all the cakes were bike themed. They will held a poster competition for non exam years and these posters were displayed around the school and also in local shops. They also raised awareness by announcing their project on the local radio and by placing an article in the local papers. They have also invited guest speakers from the RSA and the local Gardaí to come to the school to speak to all the year groups about road safety.  In the future the group plans to talk with the Sligo County Council about putting bicycle lanes in Enniscrone.  This will encourage cycling to and from school. They hope to link up with another local school and host a cycle day between the two venues. The local Gardaí have already agreed to assist with the  cycle around Enniscrone.

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This group decided to raise awareness about bicycle use and safety in their town. They visited local schools and presented a PowerPoint presentation about the benefits of cycling to the environment, the individual and how to cycle safely. They gathered information by surveying local 6th class students about their opinion on the establishment of cycle path in the town. This information is being used to back up the local council’s attempts at receiving funding for cycle paths. As a result of the project, the group were invited to be a part of a local government sub-committee supporting the establishment of cycle path and other elements necessary for the movement, such as bicycle shelters. This committee could make an immense difference in their town providing a more efficient mode, fast and healthy mode of transport. Furthermore, there will be less congested of traffic at peak hours and less CO2 emissions from cars. 

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This group began by brainstorming all of the environmental issues in their local area. They found litter was a huge problem on the beaches in Galway city and one of the most immediate needs was for more anti-litter signage and bins. The group carried out various litter surveys and research about rubbish disintegration. They designed a poster to highlight their issue and received permission to display the informative poster in the local aquatic centre, thus getting the local community on board. The group also visited a primary school and gave a presentation about their project, educating the younger generation about the negative impacts of litter to the environment. They also told the primary school students how they could reduce their litter and help with reducing litter around the beaches of Galway city. The group developed a Word search activity for the young students as part of their presentation. The group plans on expanding their project throughout the year, and continuing their campaign to get more little bins in the vicinity of the beach and to increase the number of anti-litter poster increased in the beach areas.

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This group decided to tackle the environmental issues of waste management in their school along with climate change. They chose the issue of waste management because it contributes greatly to climate change. When the group started the project there was no recycling scheme in place in their school. They discovered that their school produces a high volume of waste on a daily basis between waste papers, food and packaging and this led to the school contributing to environmental status of their local environment. As a group, they thought the best way to start off their project was to get it recognised and discussed within their school and so they decided to run an Eco-Club for first year students. 63 students signed the Eco-Club sign up sheet, so they had to create a waiting list. Through peer education they thought the first years about climate change, carried out an audit about the level of school waste over 2 days, got 4 recycling bins placed around the school, created a webpage to raise further awareness of their project,  organised a poster competition and created litter surveys and a video. They were so successful, they were invited to present their project at the Loughrea Tidy Towns Open Night.

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The aim of this project was to involve the school and local community in recycling plastic bottles. In the school alone the group identified a huge amount of Galway Water bottles sold in the canteen and shop. They hoped to put these bottles to good use. They decided that they would build a glasshouse and grow their own fruit and veg. To achieve this, they started a campaign within the school to collect as many bottles as possible. They did this through a mixture of poster campaigns and competitions such as spot prizes for students who put their bottles in the correct bin. They involved the local national school by asking for their help and suggestions on how they could build the glasshouse. The local tidy town committee also aided them in their endeavours to collect bottles. Overall the group were very active and passionate about demonstrating their concern for the environment and in actually producing something worthwhile from what was considered waste. The group have been busily growing plants and vegetables from seed within the school and they will now transfer these seedlings into the ‘Plashouse’. The group will use some of the vegetables within their school, and will sell some saplings and vegetables to the local community.

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The aim of this project is to raise awareness of the benefits of having a rooftop garden. The Youthtop Gardeners want to show Dublin how a rooftop garden cannot only tackle food security, but also the issues of climate change and reducing urban waste. Transporting goods from outside the city contributes to major greenhouse gas emissions. Rooftop gardens can often act as a carbon sink to reduce carbon emissions. Food grown locally is fresher and more likely to be organic. To help encourage other organisations and individuals in Dublin to create their own roof top gardens, the Youthtop Gardeners built their own garden in ‘the Greenhouse’ in Dublin 2, using mainly up-cycled materials to show that ‘if we can do it, you can do it’. They received advice and assistance from several professional gardeners along the way. The group also created a mural out of recycled materials to create awareness and educate people about rooftop gardens and all the potential benefits including food security, mitigating climate change, community –building, reducing unemployment and waste reduction. The rooftop garden was launched to the public on 28th March 2013.

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This group worked with a lot of young people who live in flat complexes with no individual gardens and not much space for their rubbish.  Therefore, all of their waste went into one bin. Through various activity projects, the group taught local young people how important composting is; how the compost and nutrients help the fruit, vegetables, herbs and flowers to grow. The young people also made a wormery using recycled items from a skip. They also designed a bigger wormery made from recycled construction items to encourage more composting from other areas in the community. The group also presented their project locally and highlighted all the work the work carried out, the great achievement and impact that it has had on the community.

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This project was a great success at as two years ago Mercy College’s classrooms, corridors and canteen areas were filthy with litter and waste lying everywhere. The group decided to create a Green Committee to tackle the litter problem. They began by getting extra bins, getting student ‘cleaners’, and involving the whole student body and all the staff. Seeing only slow improvements, the group decided to invite environmental speakers to give talks and help to inform their school and community. From then on, the Green Committee began to be involved in more green projects. The group introduced competitions at their school and started presenting their information on notice boards, electronic boards, through the intercom and gave students the opportunity to help the group in their mission. The school has reduced their waste significantly, and as a result, increased their recycling of paper and plastic. The group used some of the waste material gathered to create ‘recycled green fashion’. This continued to promote recycling within the school, raising further awareness on how wasteful we can all be with paper, paints and other materials. The group created fashion items and displayed them within the school to show how recycled materials can be creatively employed and used to create fashion and art.

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The group were concerned about waste.  Their school had increased its recycling, but the group wanted to aim for ‘zero waste to landfill’. They began by measuring exactly what was recycled within their school. The group carried out a bin audit and arranged to empty a collection of three day’s waste and then categorise it. They then measured what was currently being recycled and what could be done to increase this amount. They publicised the project throughout the school, raising awareness of their environmental issue throughout the project. They made presentations to other class groups and to the school to educate them about what to put in the bins. They also publicised many facts about waste. The project was recorded through photos and newspaper reports.

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The aim of this project was to reduce waste within the school and local community, whilst having fun! The group recycled paper and used some of it to make recycled paper logs. They collected rain water to water plants and used the biodegradable foods from the staff room to make compost for their eco-garden. To reduce waste in the community, the group asked all pupils to get their families to bring in recyclable goods from their homes. Families were invited to donate their old clothes, mobile phones, batteries, spectacles and bottle lids. The group wanted to help local and global organisations as part of their project. The mobile phones were donated to the MacMillan Cancer Society while the spectacles went to Vision Aid Africa. Their aim of the project was to teach people in their local community that although they may find it easy to throw everything into the bin, some items can have a second life or be recycled safely to help save and protect our environment. The group got the whole school and many members of the local community involved in their project.

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This project’s aim was to save money and reduce environmental damage. The group presented their research and information and communicated to the local community businesses and members that: It doesn’t take a lot of time, effort or money to harvest rainwater and it rewards you, as you can have reduced water charges. The group interviewed the owners of a local hotel and found they were very interested in the project. The hotel told the group that each year their water bill is approximately €2000. As they are a small hotel, a large proportion of this water used for toilets. This could be replaced by harvested water. The group also proposed that the amount of money that normal households and commercial properties will have to pay with the new water charges could be very high. The group are trying to show that this water saving scheme is a solution to reduce this cost as well as reducing negative environmental impact. The group had a great response from the public  both in Dublin as well as north Clare. The group feel that they have made students in their school think about how they use water, as well as creating a solution to lowering water charges.

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This project examines water quality and the practice of fracking. The project consisted of raising awareness of fracking as a global issue, raising awareness of water quality in their home-town and showing the importance of water, the most valuable of resources. The group accomplished this by starting an awareness campaign in their school and testing water quality in Loughrea lake. Their message: Raise awareness of water pollution in our local area and explain what we can do to help, Raise awareness of the danger of Fracking and how it affects the water quality, the possibility of it coming to Ireland and how it can affect us. They designed and created a website: http://everydropcounts.x10.mx/. The group also explored and examined the shortage of water in third world countries suffering from drought and are continuing to highlight the need for conservation of water in their local area.

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The basis for this group’s project was water conservation; students researched the effects our water usage has on the environment and areas in which water is wasted. They then researched what measures could be taken to prevent this. In groups, the students made movies on the different aspects of water wasting that they felt strongly about. Using recycled materials, they made story boards, sets and characters and shot their movie through stop motion animation. It took over 300 photos to make each movie! From re-used materials students made accordion books to document their research and ideas and to record the progress of their project. They had their movie premiere on the 7th of March. The students also designed flyers that encouraged other students in the school to come to the premiere. The premier highlighted the importance of water conservation to the whole school and to member of the local community. Everything used in their project was recycled or reused.  All in all the students proved to be true Water Warriors!