Enviroschools and sustainability are at the heart of what Wānaka Preschool does, and this

week the early childhood centre re-reflected on the Silver paragraph.

“This shows the whole school approach to sustainability is embedded and have been

evaluated with regard to people, place, programmes and protocols,” Wastebusters

Enviroschools facilitator Damian Foster said.

“This puts them well on track to achieve their ambition for green gold and the reflection

process highlighted some next steps and actions they can take to achieve this.”

Wānaka Pre-School was awarded silver in 2013 and, with a new group of teachers on board,

felt it was important to check in with the silver stage before progressing to green gold.

Wānaka Pre-School’s Christine Smith said teacher Katrina Brewer leads their Enviroschools

curriculum and the whole preschool community is involved from teachers through to the

children and parents.

“The children and parents are involved as a part of our learning community, and both our

philosophy and core values identify sustainable practices as our priority. Our parents have

supported all our key initiatives this year,” Christine said.

The initiatives included replacing plastic bags with reusable bags for wet gear, zero waste

lunchboxes and learning how to make beeswax wraps, upgrading their nature garden and

planting fruit trees, progressing their solar power project, learning from community experts,

and going out into nature to explore and discover.

Damian said the ECE has fully embraced the Enviroschools’ kaupapa and are a

fantastic example of sustainability embedded into every day practise and the

curriculum.

“The dedicated teaching staff are so in tune with the children and have created an

amazing centre that deserves to be celebrated and shared. The tamariki, kaiako and

whanau are celebrating the incredible mahi they are doing and have been doing over

the years in their very special place.”

Delivery of Enviroschools to preschools in the district is funded by not-for-profit

community enterprise Wastebusters.