Fighting for Planet A

TANYA MURPHY

TWENTY Year 5 students and five teachers from six different schools gathered at Cairns Regional Council Chambers on Monday October 19 to get empowered and inspired to make a difference for the environment.

Students who participated in last year’s Cairns Youth Climate Summit, also run by Council, gave a presentation and ran a workshop for the Year 5 students about taking action on climate change.

The students also used Zoom to attend the Sustainable Schools Summit, an event which saw more than 200 primary and secondary students, parents, teachers and school staff from 29 schools throughout Far North Queensland put their heads together to share ideas on how to make their schools more sustainable.

The event was supposed NICOLE GIBSON HER work is described as life-changing but Cairns’ only finalist in Queensland’s prestigious TEACHX awards credits her team and the strength of families at her school.

Cairns West State School (CWSS) Deputy Principal - Engagement, Cathy Nixon is one of five Queensland teachers shortlisted for the TEACHX Outstanding Contribution to School Community Award.

Since joining the school five years ago, Ms Nixon has to see the students physically gather in Cairns and Townsville, but it moved online due to COVID regulations, which allowed even more students from across the world and even internationally to attend.

Students were excited to interact with the keynote speaker Craig Reucassel, the man behind ABC’s War on Waste and #FightforPlanetA, whose humour and engaging style had the students’ full attention.

Other speakers included Cairns Australian Youth Climate Action Coalition co-founder Garrett Swearingen, and young founder of the social business enterprise, ‘Tell someone who cares’, Holley Somerville-Knott.

Students from various schools including Trinity Bay and Smithfield State High Schools also had the opportunity to give presentations about the sustainability projects in their own schools.

Freshwater State School year five student Oliver Alden led countless initiatives to improve the lives of students and their families, resulting in a 40 percent reduction in suspensions and 50 percent calmer classes.

CWSS Principal Michael Hansen said the contribution Ms Nixon makes to students and their families on a daily basis is genuinely life-changing.

“Her ability to create, maintain and support parents to engage in their children’s education is a benchmark Freshwater State School year five student Oliver Alden attended the Sustainable Schools Summit and Smithfield State High School year 12 student Anika Weremchuk was one of the presenters.

said his school had a vegetable patch and grew foods such as beans to provide to the school tuck shop.

“Growing our own vegetables means we use less plastic waste from buying food,” he said.

“We also introduced a project last year where we started turning off all electrical things before leaving the for exemplary practice in a school setting,” Mr Hansen said.

Ms Nixon is the driving force behind the school’s “It Takes a Village” strategy which provides families and students with school-based access to dozens of external support services, they may otherwise find difficult to reach.

These include medical, legal and counselling services, an on-site foodbank and other government, sporting and classroom, which reduced our climate footprint and it also saved the school a lot of money!”

Many of the sustainability projects in Cairns schools are facilitated by the Holloways Beach Environmental Education Centre.

Division Five Councillor Amy Eden said Council was dedicated to supporting community agencies like The MaraWay Community Hub.

Ms Nixon said she is overwhelmed by the recognition and credits this to CWSS’s team of exceptional educators and the commitment students’ families have to seeing them achieve.

“All of our families are really very strong,” Ms Nixon said. “All our parents want the best for their kids and all our families want their kids to succeed.” events like this because educating students was key in protecting “Planet A.”

“By learning about actions they can take in their everyday lives, these students will become leaders and get their parents and community involved too,” she said.

Ms Nixon said CWSS adopts a ‘whatever it takes’ approach and isn’t afraid to do things differently.

“Success is different to different people,” she said. “Sometimes the system needs to be tweaked a little bit to make that happen.”

The winner will be announced at the annual Queensland College of Teachers TEACHX awards on 29 October, the day before World Teachers’ Day celebrations. Briefs CEO Resigns Cairns Regional Council CEO, John Andrejic, has tendered his resignation. In his seven years at Council, Mr Andrejic has helped steer the organisation though a particularly dynamic and prosperous period – his guidance and leadership has helped to deliver six consecutive balanced Budgets and at the same time record capital expenditure programs for the city. He has also been pivotal in guiding Council through some challenging times, including the unintended by decisive consequences of the Belcarra legislation, and currently steering the response and recovery of the city through the COVID crisis. Mr Andrejic joined Council in 2013 as Chief Financial Officer and was elevated to the role of CEO in 2016. Cairns Mayor Bob Manning paid tribute to Mr Andrejic’s leadership and thanked him for invaluable assistance and counsel over the past seven years. “I would like to personally thank John for his contribution to the organisation and to the city of Cairns, and wish him and his family well,” Cr Manning said.