Kokopo Technical Secondary School had always observed the World Environment Day and in the last two years, they had featured on the Carbon Sink with the building of a mini greenhouse.
This year they made three carbon sink or green houses. The construction of the frames were pre-fabricated by the Grade 11 practical skills students, under the supervision of Social Science and Geography teacher, Elsie Ratchy.
It was a beautiful sight to see young students being sensitized about the importance of containing the carbon sink to preserve the environment. Three grade 11 geography classes took the challenge to build the green houses.
The constructions were done the weekend before the actual World Environment Day which falls on Monday 5th June.
Teacher, Mrs Rathcy explains the background of the activities in constructing the model carbon sinks.
“We tend to use the term ‘carbon sinks’ to teach the students the importance of what we are doing. Carbon sinks is actually a greenhouse where you put plants. The plants are very important to us and that’s the focus for this project here.
“Most of our lives revolve around this environment, trees and plants. Plants are important. Climate is changing because plants, forests, rain forest are being deforested by logging industries. It’s important to teach children that plants are important,” said Mrs Ratchy.
The grade 11 students over the weekend completed the carbon sink structures in which the grade 12s placed flowerpots to display on Monday during the final World Environment Day celebrations.
To compliment the efforts, the celebrations included competition for the best wears made out of traditional materials designed by the students themselves. These were displayed in a dress parade.