Progress Workshop at Wandin North and Wandin Yallock Primary School – Monday 17th August, 2026
Each term, The Eastern Alliance for Sustainable Learning (EASL) co-ordinates a workshop that aims to educate, empower and strengthen the networks of our ResourceSmart Schools educators and leaders. Cycling through EASL’s seven LGA’s, a school is selected to showcase their sustainability projects, in operations, culture and curriculum. These two primary schools co-hosted in the Yarra Ranges for Term 3.
A Sunny Guling morning greeted attendees as we settled into the colourful sustainability room at Wandin North PS decorated with RSS awards, a yabby tank, and tables with student made baked goods using their citrus harvest.
Laura, the sustainability teacher, took us through her 5-module journey as an ALMOST 5 star school! The ups and downs that many schools experience and the overarching message of the importance of asking for help. You never know what expertise is in your community, what people have to donate, and she encouraged everyone to go for all the grants and awards!
Followed by a school tour with their environment captains we saw their canopy trees with over 20 nesting boxes for different species, a rope bridge that students created in partnership with council, Habitat Warriors and Eco Warriors, a thriving orchard thanks to community, and a ‘Nest Café’ which consisted of hanging whisks in a tree stuffed with fibres for the local birds.
We then moved 10mins down the road to Wandin Yallock Primary School for morning tea and a guest presenter, Lucy Bowtell from OzHarvest. She presented on how to fight food waste through education and collaboration. OzHarvest’s FEAST program is fun and engaging and educates students about the work that goes into producing and growing food, how to cook and how to reduce waste. We learned that if you throw out a burger, by the time it got to the consumer you’d be wasting 5 bathtubs worth of water! Not to mention the eye watering statistic that households waste 1 in 5 shopping bags worth of groceries purchased.
Farmer Jill and the Wandin Yallock PS Enviro Squad students then took us on a tour of the school. With perfect weather and stunning mountains in the background we got to see their amazing farm set up. This includes insect hotel, fruit trees, log lounge, veggie garden beds, greenhouse and compost bays plus the adorable chickens whose names include Popcorn, KitKat, Peanut Butter, Silkie and Rando. The school is building a Poultry Palace for chickens and quails. They are also establishing a nature play forest (currently fenced off from little feet until it’s more established), and have ‘lunchbox garden’ wicking beds with pickables for kids to add to their lunches.
Great conversations were had over lunch and the afternoon was dedicated to RSS support. It was a great turn out and all the teachers attending could utilise the PL for any module or sustainability goals they were working on for their school. What a fabulous day!
Thank you so much to Wandin North and Wandin Yallock Primary Schools for hosting this terms progress workshop.
If you are not part of the ResourceSmart Schools Program and would like to know more please contact us at info@easl.com.au
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Want to host an event at your school? Contact easl@info.com.au or your local RSS facilitator