TENISON Woods College has been honoured at the annual KESAB Sustainable Communities Awards as best overall school for 2018.
The program, previously known as Tidy Towns, is a focus for regional communities to showcase positive action taken by communities, schools, businesses and councils across South Australia to protect their local environment, enhance their towns, embrace sustainability and showcase their initiatives.
“In past years, TWC supported the Sustainable Communities award program specifically for the City of Mount Gambier, but this year KESAB program manager Alex Hammett encouraged the school to nominate our community individually,” Tenison Woods College sustainability coordinator Tom Linnell said.
“This was a perfect opportunity to create connections and share resources with all South East communities involved.”
Culminating the process was presentation on September 26 at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre highlighting how sustainability would be incorporated into each community involved.
“A number of schools made presentations at the event with an audience comprising of significant members of councils, politicians, industry leaders and a mix of schools from across the state,” Mr Linnell said.
“Our presentation featured Tenison Woods College’s journey and vision for sustainability in education and within our region. Goals like being off-grid by 2030 resonated with the community, especially seeing we are a large school.”
He said the award highlighted the success of the college community’s efforts, including continuous school cleanups and whole school brain storming sessions on how to improve the amenity of the grounds and lessen environmental impacts.
“Young people are the integrated piece of the jigsaw puzzle for shaping the future,” Mr Linnell said.
“The KESAB Sustainable Communities Awards helped validate a number of intuitions of the school, including education opportunities, student voice, infrastructure upgrades and community involvement.”
Moving forward, the college has a focus on technology and sustainability.
Mr Linnell congratulated all nominated towns and communities and said he looked forward to a shared, sustainable future.
