Clean Up the World: Schools around Seychelles pitch in |19 September 2020
Some schools on Mahé, Praslin and La Digue including private schools joined in the movement to Clean Up the World, one of the largest community-based environmental programmes in the world.
The Ministry of Education & Human Resource Development (MEHRD) also adopted this movement as part of the curriculum and every year the schools are being encouraged to have environmental activities during a week to sensitise the children about the importance of a clean environment.
“The Clean Up the World programme tries to get community groups, schools, businesses and local governments to carry out activities that address local environmental issues. Usually the children do community activities, but due to Covid-19, we had to change the format. All eco-school leaders followed a training to abide by the health guidance. Our theme this year is ‘My waste, our health, our budget’. So no matter what we still have to do projects to keep our environment clean. This activity is very important as we try to encourage the children to take care of their environment and use fewer budgets to solve problems caused by unhealthy environment. We also talk about the dangers of leaving our wastes in the sea or the environment,” noted Lynndina Essack who is in charge of the project with the MEHRD.
Our team went around witnessing the various activities carried out by the schools:
Mont Fleuri secondary school cleaned the river near the primary school as well as the nursery and planted new cassava and sweet potato plants. They also transplanted a few medicinal plants in the medicinal garden. The students were organised in different teams accompanied by their teachers Sandra Sinon, Sandrine Valentin, Raymond Jumaye and others. Many of the youths were learning for the first time the basics of preparing the soil to plant.
Perseverance primary: The students had a special assembly where two children were able to talk about the importance of having a clean world. “Since last week, all visual art teachers and PE teachers set up this recycling exhibition using waste from home and school. All classes participated in the exhibition and today we displayed some of their work. At Perseverance, as we are a new school, we tend to do lots of environmental projects,” noted Marie-Claude Rasamivelona, the eco leader of the school. The team that accompanied the students comprise Cristel Jacques, Laura Marie, Nathalie, Cracianne and Anifa. Emelie, Ivanela, Michael and Roselle are students who participated in this exhibition. They told us that “we made flowers out of paper and also slippers out of pieces of cartons. For us clean up the world means we need to reuse the materials instead of throwing them away.”
Independent School: For one week, the children had to prepare for an exhibition using recycled materials and other students were busy with the mangroves clean-up at the school. The wildlife club moderator and the eco-school leader, Meryl Derjacques, noted that for this years’ activity “we decided to clean the mangroves in between our schools, which we adopted two years back. It’s a rehabilitated mangrove area where in the past students planted the seedlings. Our sensitisation programme is working really well. At the beginning we had lots of garbage in the area but as we go along we are noticing less and less garbage in this area. We also launched a competition last week at class level where the students collected recycling materials at home. They also had to do posters and other objects with the materials.”
Two students – Hayley De Charmoy Lablache and Dwayne Marie – shared that the Clean Up the World day means “A day when we can clean up the world and help the animals have a better life. There are many things in the mangroves that should not be there.”
Other schools also participated in the programme:
SIAH: The students cleaned the goat pen; pressure washed the boots bay; cleaned/painted the toilets and staff pantry and did general cleaning of the vegetable garden at the Anse à la Mouche farm.
SBSA: General cleaning of school ground and fruit and medicinal tree planting in their garden.
SIAD: Cleaning of school compound and inside the rooms
Mont Fleuri primary: Classifying waste, recycling exhibition, displaying of posters, beautifying the classroom i.e. cleaning of desk and painting of classroom by parents
Anse Etoile primary: Creating a flower from recycled materials; special assembly; P4- P6 beach clean-up at North East Point; school beautification; general cleaning of the class and other activities around the theme.
Anse Royale primary: Beach clean-up near the school; beautification of school
Anse Royale secondary: Beautification of the school ground
Praslin secondary: Cleaning of the Grand Anse Praslin Old People’s Home
La Retraite primary: Clean-up of North East Point beach
Perseverance secondary: Cleaning the marsh area at Perseverance assisted by SNPA.
Baie Ste Anne primary: Beautification of the school.
Bel Eau primary: P1- P2 beautification of their class; P3- P4: painting of recycled bottles and planting; P5- P6 mural painting.
Anse Boileau secondary: Beautification of the gate area and setting up of medicinal garden.
MEHRD: Beautification of ministry’s compound and cleaning of offices and removing items to take to landfill.
Clean Up the World day 2020 LEAP project through Nature Seychelles
Port Glaud primary school 21 pupils 3 teachers participated.
The accompanying photos show some highlights of yesterday’s Clean Up the World activities.
Vidya Gappy
