Reuse Electronics - Phones for Migrant Workers

Although our school EWaste bins do a great job of being a central hub for electronic waste to be reused and recycled, unfortunately, a lot of people throw away phones into ewaste bins when they're still in working condition. 

Sadly, some of these items do get sent to the prcoessing facility and can't be donated, the bins are currently just too big for our student groups to frequently go through and test.

In the meantime, the service office has set up a donation box to collect old phones to be reused by migrant workers in Singapore. Not only is this a great system to give back to our community and redistrubte items to people who can beenfit from it, especially now taht everything is organised online. This project is also a great sustinability intiative in the way that it closes the gap on harmful effects of the capitalist mindset we have,  over buying and throwing away instead of reuseing what we have. It's more sustainable to use products until we can't anymore, than throwing them away and getting the newest iPhone every other year. 

Please donate your working electronic products instead of throwing them away, or even better, sell them on platforms such as carousel, depop or Facebook Marketplace. 

Singapore Ewaste as researched by The Straits Times 

Lost and Found Market Stall

On the 10th of December a college service, The Really Really Free Market, a group that organises second-hand sales, helped to return lost items to our students. 

We are trying to reduce the waste that the lost and found inevitably produces, this cycle of losing perfectly good clothes and buying new things is not sustainable and exhausts our resources and landfill space.  

With this idea, we focus on Sustainable Development Goal 12, responsible consumption and production, lets work together to minimise the fast fashion cycle, keep our water bottles and uniforms in our possession, instead of buying new! 

Clarifying the menu - Vegan Labels

 Over the past couple of weeks, Mr Hirons and Rhianna have been working with Cholan and Pranavi in the Facilities team, to clarify which items on our menu are vegan, and displaying that. This makes life for our vegetarian and vegan students a lot easier so that we can understand our menu and our meal's ingredients. 

The menu is available on the notices every week, and is posted in the pavilion canteen. The daily counter displays are also updated with the new vegan labels. Check it out! 

Composting On Campus

Composting is the action of allowing food and plant waste to breakdown into a soil-like mixture, that recycles the nutrients, unused by humans, back into our food cycle. 

Our compost on campus has gone under much improvement since its startup, with Grade 3’s, 5’s, Green Campus and gardening groups on campus all contributing to the composting process, we should have a great deal of soil aid to feed our plants.

Grade 3’s have been collecting pod compost, food waste from various snack times and lunchtimes. Grade 5s are on a router of classes who compost during their lunchtimes, collecting orange peels, coffee groups and cafeteria scraps. The incredible edible team top up and turn the pile twice a week to encourage the breakdown process, mixing nitrogen and carbon-heavy material together. So that when it’s ready, they use it for their plants around the school! 

After the December break, the Grade 6s will be on a router to help out with a new program, Home Compost, to get staff involved in bringing their scraps from home, furthering the work we are doing to reduce the volume of waste burnt in Singapore.

What do we put in it? 

First of all we have to have our Nitrogen heavy materials, which are usually fresh and flexible plant waste, that help to provide and retain moisture. Material like grass clippings, fruit and vegetable scraps and weeds are great examples, and products we put in our compost at school. Next we need carbon heavy materials, which are older, harder, dry waste. They tend to be bulky that helps with the airflow for the breakdown process. Examples of this are fallen leaves, cardboard, tea bags and shredded paper. 

How does it work?

In composting, controlling the components is vital to ensure the chemical process of aerobic biodegradation happens. We do this by providing a good ratio of oxygen to water in the pile so that it breaks down properly. The decomposing microbes need oxygen for the chemical process breakdown, whilst the water feeds the microbes and maintains the temperature of the pile! Ideal compost is dark and crumbly. 

Why do we need to break down food scraps and organic matter? 

Plants have so many nutrients that can be used, that's why humans eat them, however, plants can use these nutrients in this full form. A chemical process has to occur to break down the complex compounds into a form a plant can take in. Within the chemical process inside a compost pile, proteins break down into amino acids which break into ions that are water soluble, great for plants! 

Why is organic compost better than store bought? 

Organic compost releases nitrogen at a slow but sustainable rate whilst synthetic fertilizers provide immediately available nitrogen, that is unsustainable for growth, leading to tall and thin plants, prone to weather damage. 

Is Composting Worth it?

Yes! It saves money and is a more sustainable fertilizer for your plants! Additionally, by diverting the food waste into your compost, you reduce the amount of landfill pilling up, (20% of it is food waste!)

Composting is an easy, cost effective process that everyone can benefit from, if not for plants in your own house, for those in your community!