9B’s Environmental Project
In December, form 9B started an environmental project by recycling used Christmas Cards. The aim was to send these to the woodland trust, who for every tonne collected would plant a tree. The project has since escalated and we are now working with Groundworks, Barnsley on a number of enterprises within the community and at school. Past pupils are learning the trade of landscape gardening under the watchful eye of the Groundworks’ team.

They are creating a “peace garden” at the front of school which will be used as part of their NVQ assessment. Year 9 pupils have been helping by planting and watering the garden.

A Graffiti artist from Rawmarsh is working with Mr. Swann’s Y9 Technology group to create artwork for display within the community that incorporates what “Thrybergh” means to the students in terms of its past, its present and its future. This project began on the 24th of June and the majority of the students gave up their time in order to get it off to a flying start. On the first session, the students learnt the importance of good planning and preparation. They then began to develop their ideas onto paper and the evening finished with a demonstration of spray painting and different effects. Progression for the project has continued with the Y9s taking photographs of local “landmarks” prior to incorporating these into the project. It is envisaged that the project will run definitely throughout the remainder of this academic year and is hoped to continue into 2009/10

In May we started looking at Dalton Park and the surrounding recreational area’s with a view to their suitability for people of all generations in the Dalton, Thrybergh, East Herringthorpe areas. We conducted a school based survey to establish the views of the students as to the current state of the facilities. From this we have identified that a lot of young people use the area but are unhappy with the state and amount of facilities and they feel that this is a contributing factor in low level anti-social behaviour in the area. We are now planning to circulate a similar survey within the community in order to obtain an adult prospective.

9B, Groundworks and RMBC have been discussing the development of the play area, the Brooke and the path up to “the Top Club” in order to clean the area and make it a safer and more pleasant environment. With this in mind we made a start on the 23rd June in the sunshine by going to the Park and beginning the process of clearing the undergrowth. Having spent all day toiling with gardening equipment we made a small but significant inroad into the work, but in doing so came to appreciate more fully the scale of the task ahead. Our work did not go unnoticed by members of the local community. More than one dog-walker stopped to ask us what we were doing and they were all very impressed that students were using their time in such a profitable way to improve the facilities for the local community.

Finishing the day with a walk along the Brook and back to the Top Club by Thrybergh Primary School, the students conducted an environmental survey en route and were able to further identify improvements that needed to be made. These were discussed with Kevin Burke from Groundworks on their return and the findings of the surveys has been passed back to Groundworks and RMBC for inclusion in the development plan.

This project has already received local recognition. Two members of the form – Liam License-Hooley and Kelly-Louise Turner collected a Rotherham Young Achievers Environment Award on behalf of the class at the prestigious awards dinner held at The Consort Hotel, Thurcroft in May where they were commended for the contribution they were making to the local environment for all the community.

To further increase the input of the local community there will be regular updates on the school website and we would like to appeal to anyone with old photos of the area to loan them to us in order for us to scan them to use in our studies ( they will be returned).