Go Green with Roots & Shoots

Go Green with Roots & Shoots

– the 2013 R&S National Volunteer Service Day

To celebrate the R&S Day together with the National Volunteer Service Day on December 5, R&S groups from 51 schools (primary school to university level) in 6 provinces (Shanghai, Jiangsu, Guangdong, Anhui and Jiangxi) did voluntary service work in schools and communities. The event featured three themes.

• Recycling:

Inside the school, educate students on garbage sorting methods, sorting garbage into five categories, as is being promoted by the Shanghai government.

• Environmental protection during the vacation:

Focus on reducing the large quantity of garbage generated over long holidays. For example, one can find a huge amount of leaflets outside subway stations and plastic bags outside shopping plazas. Pick up garbage to keep our city clean and carry out banner-signing activities in shopping malls to publicize the reduction of garbage and leaflets.

•  Community service:

Every group should find a community or school to give a participatory lesson elaborating on garbage classification methods through interactive games about 3R. Each class has at least 30 participants. Groups can focus extra efforts on garbage sorting.

Altogether, 51 schools participated in the activity and with the effort of 200 volunteers, we gave speeches in 27 schools and 9 residential communities and carried out 10 signing activities in all. More than 4500 students and 3200 citizens benefited from these activities. Many schools even gave school-wide speeches and organized campaigns, appealing to the whole faculty and student body, encouraging them to live a greener life.

At the end of the activity, we rewarded some groups and their leaders for their excellent performance.

The awards list:

• Excellent Community Volunteer:

Hu Changcheng

Luo Zhongyao (Shanghai Qingpu Senior High School)

Shao Yawen (Shanghai Jiaotong University)

• Excellent Student Group:

Jiangsu Xishan Senior High School

Yucai Middle School of the Shenzhen Yucai School Education Group

the Attached Middle School to Jiangxi Normal University

•  Award For The Best Organizing Effort:

Wanxi College

the Attached Primary School to the Provincial Academy

Shanghai Kongjiang Senior High School

“Garbage classification needs to be carried out step by step. We will make efforts all the way! We can set an example for our family members, friends and people around us. Let’s form the habit of protecting the environment and make it an integral part of social education.”—— Shenzhen Yucai Middle School

“Many parents with children were very enthusiastic about our activities and some students even did different kinds of environmental protection activities in their schools. And I was really moved by some senior citizens in the signing activity who said that this was exactly what they needed to do to help the environment.”—— Shixi Middle School

R&S will continue to work hard, together with you, to promote “Reduce, Reuse and Recycle”.