‘Sustainable’ Regis School wins national award

The Virgin Atlantic ‘Change is in the Air Award’, which is run by WE Charity. was presented to the Bognor school after its Rights Respecting School Student Ambassadors, submitted an application ‘overflowing with ideas’ on how to improve sustainability across the school. A school spokesman said: “As part of their application, the students pledged to reduce the number of rubbish crates being sent to landfill and to significantly increase recycling rates. The school now has £2,000 to spend on recycling initiatives and awareness raising.” Caroline Saunders, assistant principal, said: “We are thrilled to have won this award. The student ambassadors worked incredibly hard on their application and are very worthy winners. This award, however, is only the beginning for us and kick starts a new sustainability focus at the school. “As part of our commitment to deliver an education with eharacter, we constantly seek to impress on students how they have a responsibility to protect the environment they live in. Our students take this responsibility very seriously and have an excellent understanding of the steps they can all take to reduce their impact on the environment.” Laura Reynolds, senior programmes manager at the We Charity, said the application ‘stood out from the others’. She said: “I’m so pleased to say that The Regis School has won one of the Change is in the Air Award grants for 2019! “The judges from Virgin Atlantic absolutely loved the application and how much it stood out from the others for creativity and the amount of detail and research that had gone into it.” Students Phoebe Reeves and Paige Smith said: “We went to Ford Materials Recycling Facility (MRF) on Wednesday January 23. The safety precautions they take were incredible, everyone has to hold handrails on the stairs wherever they go, no food or drink may be consumed anywhere on site, and no photographs are to be taken. “We first saw a video explaining how the MRF works, and the fact that it works for 24 hours a day and processes paper, plastics, metals and glass.” Now working with the Green Team at The Regis School, Phoebe and Paige are ‘really keen’ to reduce the amount of landfill they produce increase the amount they recycle. “We think this is going to be a very exciting time for our school and changing the way we look at our rubbish. “We have really had our eyes opened to think differently about how we can recycle at home and at school and would like to say a massive thank you to the team at the MRF for their time.”