Tree planting

Students at The Marches School get hands on to help tackle climate change

As part of The Marches Academy Trust, The Marches School in Oswestry have committed to developing a strategy to create and maintain a sustainable future – one of their pledges is to make sure the school estate minimises its environmental impact. As such, today (Wednesday 9th November) has been the start of an exciting ‘Tree Planting’ project across the school site, which will also continue on Thursday 10th November.

The Marches School aims to plant approximately 630 new saplings in order to increase their storage of carbon dioxide across the school’s estate, helping to play their part to reduce climate change. Taking action is so important, with reports as recently as last week stating that wildlife populations have declined by 69% since the 70’s (WWF Living Planet Report 2022) and if action is not taken, the world will warm by 2.8oC this century, leading to dangerous climate change (United Nations Environment Programme, 2022).

The students have shown great enthusiasm for the initiative, getting hands on to plant the trees themselves. The project is also a great chance for the students to learn about carbon sequestration and biodiversity, which will support Geography and Science lessons. Members from the school’s Eco-Club have also been carrying out work ahead of planting, to measure carbon sequestration and summarise the biodiversity of species the trees will support.

An Eco-Club student, from the school commented; “We measured the carbon content of some of the trees in our eco-garden and investigated how the new trees planted will provide habitats and food for the biodiversity it will support.”

The work is also part of the Community Tree Scheme, in conjunction with DEFRA’s Trees Outside Woodlands Scheme – as such the school would like to thank Shropshire Council who have donated 210 hedgerow saplings, whilst 420 large wild harvest saplings have been kindly given by The Woodland Trust. These are being planted at various sites around The Marches School to fill gaps in rows of trees between their sports fields, filling in hedges around the site and also creating a new double layer hedge.

The Marches School are also working in partnership with Oswestry Town Council who helpfully donated trees as they too have eco ambitions – to plant 17,000 trees (1 for each resident). The school were lucky to also have support from the Oswestry Town Mayor, Councillor Jay Moore who offered to help students and staff dig and plant trees.

Many thanks from The Marches School also go to Shropshire Wildlife Trust and the community of Oswestry for donating lots of spades and gloves to enable them to plant the trees.

Miss Price, joint organiser of The Marches Eco-Club and of the tree planting day said; “Our tree planting event is an amazing opportunity for our students to be hands-on amongst nature knowing they are actively doing their bit to help combat the effects of climate change. We are so lucky to have been donated so many trees and to work with some wonderful local businesses which strengthens our links within the community. I am super excited about this wonderful event!”