Twelve IB students gather in the Biology classroom as part of their Group IV project . Anticipation hangs in the air as they look at the data from the previous evening’s garbage audit. At first they are unsure how to proceed but then they power up their computers and open up Excel. Keyboards are clicking, expressions are concentrated. I circle around and begin to see pie and bar graphs appearing all over the room on the computer screens
“Can you believe we throw away over 1 kg of paper and plastic cups every day?” exclaims one student. “Whoa, look at this, 35% of our garbage is recyclables!”, cries out another. “That’s a lot of food waste” “I think we can reduce our weight by at least 1/3 this year”. And so it went. For two hours the students crunched numbers, manipulated Excel data, created graphs, and analyzed their results.
The final conclusions haven’t been reached but everyone is quite excited about what they’ve uncovered. Over the next few weeks the students will share their results to the Going Green group at the school for that committee to submit a recommendation on how to reduce waste at the school. The IB students will also formulate a proposal for next year’s Group IV project in the area of Going Green.
I’m quite happy with this initial event that the Going Green group has completed. It will definitely generate awareness and hopefully be an impetus for change at the school.