Bishop Smith students clean up around their school 0
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Ryan Paulsen ryan.paulsen@sunmedia.ca Bishop Smith Catholic School environmental action committee co-presidents Bronwyn Edwards, left, and Danielle McCluskey, right, take a brief break from the school's annual clean-up day with Kiana Ruddy and just a few of the larger items that the crew of roughly 150 students were able to drag out of the ravine behind the school. For more community photos please visit our website photo gallery at www.thedailyobserver.ca.
For as long as anyone at the school can remember, Bishop Smith Catholic High School in Pembroke has been holding a massive clean-up day each fall, sending scores of students out along the banks of the Indian River to pick up garbage, big and small.
This year, roughly 150 students took part in the event, which carried the double benefit of helping the Earth, and getting excused from class to spend an hour outside.
But environmental action committee co-president and event organizer Danielle McCluskey says that the environmental enthusiasm level seems to drop as the high school years go by, but there’s still plenty of gusto involved in the clean-up day.
“Some of them,” she says, “especially the younger kids, like the Grade 8s and 9s, seem more enthusiastic, but the older ones you may have to pressure into coming out sometimes.”
Clearly, the event is a popular one, despite the reticence of some of the older students, with three entire classes coming out to lend a hand for the hour-long clean-up project.
According to the EAC’s other co-president, Bronwyn Edwards, a surprising amount of trash accumulates by the river, including a small fort made out of couches that the students pulled up a few years ago.
All of the trash collected was deposited into a dumpster donated by Dumpy’z, which also volunteered to collect and dispose of the garbage after the day was concluded.
Ryan Paulsen is a Daily Observer multimedia journalist. Follow him on Twitter @PRyanPaulsen.
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