Pretoria learner outshines rest of Africa in sustainability competition
The competition encouraged learners to come up with innovative and creative solutions to reduce the environmental impact of their school.
Grade 6 learner from Pretoria east-based Maragon Olympus School, Albie Nel, has made staff and the other learners at his school proud by winning a sustainability competition against other competitors from across Africa.
Nel recently won the Small Changes for Big Results competition during the third annual IIE MSA Water Symposium held on July 4 and 5.
The competition aimed to encourage learners to come up with innovative solutions to reduce their school’s environmental impact.
The Centre for Water and the Environment at the IIE MSA, in partnership with the Ecological Engineering Institute of Africa (EEIA), and ADvTECH hosted the symposium and competition.
The symposium was held under the theme, “Citizen Science – Uniting Science and Society for Sustainable Solutions”.
Nel embarked on a mission to create awareness about the importance of recycling at his school.
To achieve this, he devised an experiment that demonstrated that placing recycling bins in strategic, highly visible places created awareness and interest in recycling and led to more students recycling waste.
Nel won R5 000 for his entry and R25 000 for his school to implement his recycling solution.
The competition was open to all students at ADvTECH preparatory schools and colleges to enter either as part of a group or as individuals.
During the competition, no limits were imposed, as long as the focus was on sustainability.
“We received video and poster entries from across Africa, offering solutions to issues like food and solid waste, water scarcity and energy,” said Tashila Hans, ADvTECH communications co-ordinator.
Hans said Omoshonevho Aliu from Gaborone International School won second prize for a proposed solution to water wastage and shedding. The third prize went to Lisa Murori from Crawford International School in Kenya, for a solution to food waste management and disposal at her school.
She said education is key to addressing and responding to sustainability risks like climate change, pollution and water scarcity.
“With this competition, we hoped to harness the power of education by giving students in our schools the opportunity to use knowledge, creativity and future-forward thinking to come up with innovative, inventive strategies to deal with current and future risks facing our planet.”
According to Hans, the outcome has shown that the learners understand that “a small change” can make a huge impact if consistently implemented.
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