John Gray students highlight environment

DEH staff line up with proud students from JGR. Left to
right, Chantal Pearson-Gooding, DEH Director Roydell
Carter, Catherine Welds, Melissa Smith, Acting
Assistant Director (Solid Waste) Ronald Dilbert,
Promotion Officer Shannon McKenzie, Assistant
Director Dr Paulino Rodrigues, Eldon Parchmon, DEH
Building Control Officer and Bentley Vaughan

Wednesday, June 23, 2004

The John Gray High School club recently hosted representatives from the Department of Environmental Health to commemorate World Environment Day, and to discuss plans to travel to Fiji next month.

Visiting DEH Director, Roydell Carter acknowledged the club for their perseverance and hard work.

He said: “We applaud your efforts and dedication over the years, for the many diverse projects you have undertaken.

“The DEH will continue to give support to your endeavors as they embrace our broad objectives for the protection and enhancement of our environment.

“Furthermore, I encourage the public to become more involved with the activities of the JGR club, and I would like to challenge other schools on the three islands to become more active in these kinds of environmental health related activities.”

The theme for this year’s World Environment Day was Wanted! Seas and Oceans: Dead or Alive? The United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) has stated that more than 3.5 billion people depend on the ocean for their primary source of food.

Eighty per cent of all pollution in seas and oceans come from land-based activities. Pollution from plastic kills up to 1 million sea birds, 100,000 sea mammals and countless fish each year.

Club members showcased various environmental projects such as recycling, coral reef preservation, environmental pollution, turtle tracking, clean-ups, Earth Day activities, and the Baby Blue Iguana project.

The club also has plans for an environmental float for the Pirates Week parade.

The JGR club was started eight years ago by teacher Christine Whitehead. Since then, the club has been extremely busy and has approximately 20 active students.

One of last year’s highlights was winning the Commonwealth Youth Award.

The JGR club has put their award money toward next month’s trip to the Fiji islands, where they will work with islanders on building a pre-school in a local village.

In return, the islanders have agreed to start to develop a preservation programme for the coral reef.

“The students put so much time and work into these projects, but lack of funding hinders us from accomplishing much more,” said Mrs Whitehead.
One of the club’s future objectives is to get the Sister Islands involved.

For more information on the club visit the website at www.johngrayrecyclers.com

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