education

The question of whether environmental protection and a sustainable way of life are issues for young people probably no longer needs to be asked. In times of initiatives such as "Fridays For Future" and a rapidly growing number of young vegetarians, it is clear that today's young people want to actively participate in tomorrow's world. Following this trend, the district of Görlitz wanted to support the schools in their active environmental work with the pupils. This is how the idea of ​​an environment day for the district of Görlitz came about.

Diverse actions

The school and sports department of the district applied to the Saxon hands-on fund with this idea and was awarded the contract to implement it. Together with our education service point, we started preparing last year. All schools were informed and invited to participate. In the end, 31 schools were actively involved – from elementary school to high school, all school types were represented. We made suggestions for possible campaigns, but the content was entirely up to the schools. Trees were planted, the schoolyard was made friendlier, insect hotels and bird houses were built, rubbish was removed and the school garden was expanded with new plants. Service center manager Saskia Heublein and her team held the threads together and supported the organization of the environmental day in the schools: "On request, we also organized experts on specific topics to give lectures in the schools".  

Environmental education that tastes good

An intact environment is also pretty tasty. The ten schools that took part in the "Healthy Breakfast" campaign can definitely confirm that. Together with Anja Nixdorf Munkwitz (Ein Korb voll Glück) we put together a breakfast with regional products. So nothing from the supermarket around the corner, but everything from local farmers, beekeepers, bakers and butchers. And so that the products and their possible preparation are not forgotten so quickly, there was also the brochure "Sustainable view of the plate" with lots of tips and recipes from the nutrition blogger Jenny Böhme from Rothenburg.  

Keep going

Actually, the Environment Day should take place across the district on a fixed date. Due to Corona, however, each school was then able to set the date of the action day independently within the school year. A few days ago, all schools involved received a certificate signed by District Administrator Bernd Lange and Marlies Wiedmer Hüchelheim from the School and Sports Office. The certificate is not only a confirmation of participation, but also an appreciation of the commitment in the field of environmental education.

"The Environment Day should not have been a flash in the pan," says organization manager Saskia Heublein. “The campaign was very well received by the approx. 1,500 actively participating schoolchildren. We would like to continue the Environment Day next year. Next week we will start with a first evaluation of this year's campaign. And we are thinking about how we can continue it in 2022.”