Energy

After staffing costs energy is one of the major costs to schools. This year children from orange class have been monitoring and looking at ways to save and reduce energy around the school and at home.

Various activities have taken place during the autumn and spring terms including a competition for the children to design an energy saving poster focusing on different types of energy. Monitors from orange class have been given the responsibility to ensure that items using electricity are switched of when not used, taps are turned off and ensuring doors are closed to keep heat loss to a minimum. Different group are taken each month to read and record the meter readings. We have held a ‘Save Energy’ afternoon in school where the electrical equipment will be turned off for a short time and pupils watched the meters to compare usage. Children from all the classes have made foot prints around the school showing how they plan to save energy in school and at home.

The focus for the summer term is on water wastage and showing the children how much is wasted when taps are left running. The children in orange class will be saving and recycling water where possible and will use any saved water to give to their plants during their ‘Growing Plants’ topic.

On behalf of the school, Bucks County Council purchases our energy which enables the cost to be negotiated on a larger scale, therefore giving us a better deal. All though prices have increased, the reduction in our energy consumption has meant that our costs have remained fairly stable. We have arranged for an independent company to carry out an energy survey around the school which will help identify areas where we could save energy and costs. We hope this will take place during the summer term.

Special assembly with a parent visitor talking about fossil fuels and carbon footprints.