School wins £3,000 prize for green efforts

BRYNGWYN Comprehensive School has won a £3,000 prize for its work to go green.

The Llanelli school took third place in the council’s first ever Eco Challenge Award scheme.

The aim of the challenge was to find out who was the cleverest when it came to energy conservation, reducing waste and environmental best practice. It was open to all secondary schools in the county.

The panel of judges were particularly impressed with the way in which the school was recycling its waste and reducing litter by minimising packaging.

The school has also installed energy saving devices; undertaken safe routes to schools initiatives and is creating an outdoor classroom for learning.

As well as the prize money, the school has also received litter recycling bins so that pupils can recycle in the school yard as well as inside the classroom to further reduce the amount of waste going to landfill.

Carmarthenshire County Council’s Executive Board Member for Education Cllr Gwynne Wooldridge and local member Cllr Tegwen Devichand went along to the school to hand over the cheque.

Cllr Wooldridge said: “I would like to congratulate all the pupils and staff for all their efforts and hard work in improving the school environment which will go a long way to reducing their overall carbon footprint.”

Cllr Devichand added: “I am very impressed with the good work being carried out at Bryngwyn School and I think we could all learn a lesson from them in how to be more environmentally-friendly in our daily lives.”

The prize money will be used to create a pond/wildlife area in the school grounds so that primary school children who are due to make the transition to secondary school can use it for pond-dipping and classroom studies.

Bryngwyn is currently working towards the Silver award under the Eco Schools programme.

Headteacher Paul Jones said: “I am delighted at the way the pupils and staff have taken ownership of this initiative. It is fantastic that the pupils are so aware of the impacts on the environment and want to do something about it. We are confident of achieving the Silver award in the next few weeks.”