Over the summer, we had feedback from our first application to become a Green Flag Accredited School. The Eco-Schools programme empowers young people to make a difference in their school, local community and beyond. Since 1994, millions of young people around the world have been recognised for their efforts with a prestigious Eco-Schools Green Flag. This a huge achievement, particularly for our Eco Council, which is supported by our Forest School and Sustainability Lead, Jane Millin. The assessors gave the following feedback. 

“Congratulations!!!

Fantastic work!

We are very pleased to tell you that you and your Eco-Committee at Larkrise Primary School have been successful in meeting the requirements for the Eco-Schools Green Flag Award.

We reviewed your application and noted the following:

It’s very impressive that you have formed such a large Eco-Committee, and it would be great to see more adult support in the future. It shows that young people in your school are aware of environmental issues and committed to being active and creating positive change. This knowledge and attitude have provided your school with excellent foundations for the many successes that you’ve achieved this year. 

It’s brilliant that young people were given the responsibility of recording meeting minutes. This will allow them to take ownership of the Eco-Schools programme and develop their listening, communication and teamwork skills. 

We love the inclusive approach you’ve taken to setting your Eco-Committee. This sets a positive and encouraging tone for your work, which supports a collaborative and community ethos, vital in maximising impacts. Great work!”

The team loved the photographs provided of your fantastic Eco-Committee – what a brilliant bunch!

It's brilliant to read that the Environmental Review helped your pupils appreciate everything that your school is already doing to benefit our environment and identify areas to work on in the future. Your Eco-Committee didn’t let any tricky questions on the Environmental Review defeat them, instead, they sought out other experts in their school such as your headteacher and business manager to help answer questions which demonstrates their resilience and team ethos. It was lovely to read all the comments on your Environmental Review and gain a real insight into the debate and discussion that took place whilst completing it.

It’s clear your Eco-Committee are constantly considering what actions they can take to improve their local community and benefit our planet. We love that your Environmental Review inspired the choice of projects in your Action Plan. It’s a strong approach to work on things that will produce visible impact and change, and a great example of critical thinking. Your Action Plan shows that your Eco-Committee have carefully considered how they can involve their entire school in their planned Eco-Schools’ activities to achieve maximum impacts and raise awareness amongst their school community. It was fantastic to read about your plans to give students a wide choice of actions to choose from to keep them engaged. We love the variety of activities that you and your Eco-Committee have included in the Action Plan. This will no doubt support multi-disciplinary skills and shows how integrated environmentalism is in your school.

The three curriculum examples provided are a great example of environmental education. They are practical and fun examples of eco-education with a real-life context that will engage young people. It’s clear that you have embedded environmental issues into your curriculum with great enthusiasm and these issues are being used to enrich learning in your school, whilst engaging young people in important issues. It was great to see uploaded examples of your classroom materials and evidence. It shows a clear commitment to ensuring your pupils get engaging environmental education. Great work by all involved!

You have placed a lot of emphasis on informing as many members of your school community as possible in your Eco-Schools work and this is a strength of your application. Getting involved with World Ocean Day as well as OUWG are great examples of collaboration. Your ability and willingness to partnership is impressive! We’ll need this approach to fight the impacts of climate change in the future! You have made significant efforts to involve all pupils and your wider school community, maximising the impacts of your Eco-Schools work and benefitting your local area and our planet – we want to commend your plans to get more involved in the wider community in coming years.

We hope all staff members involved in your Eco-Schools work take immense amounts of pride from the parental quote uploaded from Rowan’s grown-up. Your hard work and dedication has inspired young people and empowered them with the belief that they can positively impact our planet – this is something incredibly special.

Your greatest successes link clearly to the experience of your pupils. We loved reading about your success in implementing the 10 Eco-School topics throughout your curriculum. This is what the best forms of climate action are about – impactful but achievable things that create a positive experience and prompt more action. We love this! Keeping everyone engaged throughout the year is a common challenge, familiar to all educators. It creates a pressure and takes resilience to keep going. With this context, your achievements are even greater, and we feel lucky that you’ve committed to our programme and delivered the achievements that you have.

This is a big achievement. Your acrostic poem Eco-Code is beautifully designed, and easy to follow with a powerful message and we love that you were able to use ‘LARKRISE’. It’s a great reflection of the ethos your Eco-Committee have created, well done to all involved in creating the beautiful poster! It has been an absolute pleasure to read through your application, you are a wonderful ambassador for the Eco-Schools programme and we are delighted, without hesitation, to award you an Eco-Schools Green Flag – congratulations!

The work completed for this award will feed into our Inspire Curriculum. A huge thank you again goes to Jane Millin and the Eco Council!