WASTE WISE ACCREDITATION

1) TCEC turtle build 2) TCEC building recycling boxes for College Campus 3) Junior School Waste Warriors 4) First meeting of TCEC and UNAWA

2.

3.

4.

TRINITY COLLEGE Waste Wise Accreditation

It seems that all the hard work of the Trinity College Environmental Committee (TCEC) has come to fruition with Trinity College being awarded with official Waste Wise Accreditation as part of the Waste Wise Schools program of Waste Authority of Western Australia.

In order to achieve accreditation, the College has had to follow a number of steps, processes have had to be put in place and evidence of long-term sustainability initiatives being commonplace around the College being provided. The process has taken around 18 months to complete and this has opened the doors to many ideas, activities and plans for increasing sustainability within the College community. Staff were required to attend Professional Development in the area of Sustainability in Schools in order to begin the process. This was followed by a compulsory ‘Waste Audit’ to examine and investigate what type of landfill we were producing daily at the College. The TCEC expanded to include staff, more students and other interested stakeholders and became more formal in its operation with minuted meetings, agendas and action points becoming the norm. The College also developed and ratified an official Sustainability Policy which will shape and drive the way forward for sustainability initiatives at the College. A number of events and workshops were held at Trinity to educate and inform our community about sustainable alternatives. Some of these were: • a worm farm incursion in the Junior

School and a worm café being set up • staff and parent wax wrap workshops • introduction of Junior

School Waste Warriors • transitioning to compostable packaging in the canteen • participating in a Recycled

Sculpture Competition • a waste free coffee van initiative • proposal for a sustainability focused academic elective

• registration with the Western

Australian Division of United

Nations Association of Australia • ongoing partnership with the

Greenbatch Foundation for recycling plastic #1, #2 and aluminium cans • compostable tea bags introduced into the staff room • ongoing partnership with

TerraCycle to recycle stationery and beauty product packaging • excursions to a waste free canteen and Greenbatch HQ • awarding of College badges to students actively participating in TCEC for two years If the COVID-19 pandemic has taught us nothing else, it has certainly shown us that changes in human activity can very quickly have a positive impact on the Earth and our environment and it really is in our hands to look after it for future generations. Waste Wise Accreditation is an ongoing process to be renewed every year by continuing to provide evidence of looking after our College environmentally which we hope to achieve regularly.

Ms Alison Mackenzie

Trinity College Environmental Committee