CRANBOURNE Secondary School has held a conference for primary school children to highlight the importance of protecting the environment.

The conference, entitled Going Green, took place on Friday, June 17, and was attended by 120 children between the ages of four and 11.

The children were school council representatives from Cranbourne’s family of primary schools.

The “2022 Cranbourne Cluster Conference” was the first event of its kind in two years, and there was a celebratory mood as children got to grips with planning for a green future.

The Conference was opened by Ugbana Oyet, the Serjeant at Arms for the House of Commons, who spoke of his ambition for the Palace of Westminster to be carbon neutral by 2050.

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The day’s workshops focused on teaching the young minds about endangered species, carbon reduction and supporting our local ecosystems.

The workshops included sessions from Quirk’s Animal Handling as well as various activities such as building bug hotels, making bee bombs with wildflower seeds, and creating a green innovation hub.

There was also a hands-on planning session with Charlotte Koch of 4Green Architecture and Andy Molloy, assistant development engineer with the B2B Solutions Team, EON.

Year 8 Cranbourne student Bhaswati Murali said: “The Cluster Conference was very exciting for both Cranbourne and Primary students.

“The activities were really engaging, and I think the students involved were certainly inspired to go green!

“The children especially like making bee bombs, I made one to take home myself.

“The visit from a member of staff from Parliament was enlightening and his story empowered me to ‘go carbon free’ too!”

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Year 9 student Luize Cakstina agreed, saying: “It was a great opportunity to get a good insight on what we can do to reduce our personal and collective carbon footprint.”

The conference was organised by Miss Sam Miller, head of Gilbert White House.

She commented: “It was fantastic to see how engaged the students were in all the different activities throughout the day and learn how we can all contribute to a greener future for our planet.

“There was an electric atmosphere in the hall at the end of the day and lots of smiling faces as they departed with their bug hotels.”

All participating schools departed with a birch seedling donated from Wote Street People to plant in their school grounds for future generations.

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