The fantastic environmental focus of pupils and staff at Pennar Community School is being celebrated once again as they pick up an award in Keep Wales Tidy's Climate Challenge Cymru.

The school recently won the innovation challenge in the Build a Waste-Free World category, with an inspiring film documenting their campaign to tackle waste in school and at home.

They were presented with their award, at a special ceremony in Cardiff last month.

Each class took on a different aspect of waste to focus on during the Spring Term ranging from plastic pollution to fast fashion.

Year 5 and 6 classes have been monitoring the amount of food waste produced in the school and have been working with Jennifer James from the charity Awel Aman Tawe to reduce food waste.

Siân Taylor, the school’s Sustainability Lead, said: “Sustainability is at the core of all we do at Pennar School, and the environmental work led by the school’s Green Team has been embedded into our constantly evolving curriculum.

“The waste project was inspired by the issues raised in our annual COP (Conference of Pennar) Climate Conference and so the work has truly been led by the learners. Every pupil and member of staff has been involved in this work, and it is ongoing in the school. We are absolutely delighted that their hard work and dedication has been recognised at the Climate Challenge Cymru Awards.”

The awards, founded by First Minister Eluned Morgan, showcase environmental work from schools all over Wales.
The awards, founded by First Minister Eluned Morgan, showcase environmental work from schools all over Wales. (PCC)

The Green Team has also been reducing the school’s energy consumption and it is currently leading the Energy Sparks league table for Wales. The team’s work has also led to the recent achievement of Eco Schools’ Platinum Award.

PCC’s Cabinet Member for Education, Cllr Guy Woodham, said: “These are fantastic achievements for Pennar Community School, the staff and pupils are showing an admiral commitment to their work combatting climate change.”