Prestigious Eco-Schools Green Flag Award for Wellacre

Posted at 10:57 am on 3rd July, 2024

Wellacre’s Eco-Committee Achieves Green Flag in Style

Wellacre Academy has received international accreditation for their commitment to ecology, sustainability and environmental projects.

The operators of Eco-Schools England, Keep Britain Tidy, award the Green Flag to acknowledge, reward and celebrate the ecological achievements of young people. The award demonstrates students’ hard work and provides them with the confidence and motivation to continue actively engaging with environmental issues throughout their lifetimes. 

Wellacre successfully achieved the Green Flag after a student Eco-Committee, led by Mr Toogood, Leader of Science, passionately showcased Wellacre’s commitment to both the programme and the eco-cause.

An Environmental Review highlighted everything that Wellacre is undertaking to benefit the school and wider community including weekly extracurricular activities in the on-site Ecology Centre, an established wildflower garden, meat-free mondays in the canteen, an Active Travel campaign and annual entries in the RHS Tatton Flower Show. 

In completing the review, the Eco-Committee identified further opportunities for development and are launching a clear Eco-Code and Action Plan to communicate their aims and engage the whole student body. 

The aims include improving the knowledge and awareness of the importance of biodiversity through the outreach project for the RHS Tatton Flower Show 2024 and plans to plant 700 trees at school to reduce carbon footprint. 

Wellacre also intends to use the extensive green space at Wellacre to improve student and community awareness of green space preservation with a planned seed swap with community allotment groups in September and tree planting in line with the launch of a Forest School in 2024/25.

Finally, Wellacre will introduce and promote a ‘no engine idling’ policy as a way of improving education about global warming. 

As part of maintaining the Green Flag Award, the Eco-Committee will strive to promote and raise awareness of their Action Plan and will also proactively generate and act upon more sustainability initiatives such as composting of food waste from the canteen and increasing the supply of produce from the Eco-Centre beds to Food and Cookery lessons and the Wellacre canteen.

Mr Toogood, Leader of Science, said:

“I am so proud of the work we do at Wellacre, and the Eco-Committee's support, in helping to secure the Green Flag Award.  The student team are a really enthusiastic group who are eager to raise awareness of our Eco-Code and progress the action plan. 

“The Green Flag communicates to Wellacre’s wider community that we are forward-thinking and that we are actively promoting inspiring environmental education led by our students.”

Wellacre’s inspiring new Eco-Code:

We will increase biodiversity

We will plant trees

We will all grow a plant each year

We will appreciate nature

We will go plastic free

Eco-Schools England Manager, Adam Flint, said: 

“The Eco-Schools’ Green Flag is an international benchmark that demonstrates a commitment to fighting climate change and a high standard of sustainable practice. Students and staff who earn this award deserve recognition for their dedication toward protecting our planet. Every day, they demonstrate that each of us can contribute to making our planet a better, more sustainable, place.”