The NSW Department of Education and Training delivers high quality, internationally competitive public education and training from early childhood (pre-school), through to the compulsory years of schooling (Kindergarten to Year 10), and senior secondary education leading to the award of the NSW Higher School Certificate (in Years 11 and 12).
It also provides TAFE NSW courses, adult and community education courses, migrant English programs, post-secondary art courses and advice to the NSW Government on higher education. The Department is particularly focused on addressing the training needs of industry and meeting the challenge of skills shortages in certain trades.
What is the NSW Department of Education and Training Hunter/Central Coast doing to help the environment?
Students learning how to help our environment
Learning about our environment and smart use of energy and water is a key issue for students in government schools from Kindergarten to Year 12
Environmental education policy states that each school is to develop a School Environmental Management Plan to cover three focus areas. First, what students learn in the curriculum, for instance how ecosystems work, the impact of people on the environment, the principles of ecological sustainability, assessing environmental issues and how to apply knowledge and skills to resolve such issues. Second, is how the school manages its own resources and how students can learn from this and finally how the school can best manage its own grounds in an environmentally sustainable way.
Schools can draw on the expertise at the State’s Environmental Education Centres in developing and implementing their plans.
Across the Hunter and Central Coast Region teachers and students are excelling in environmental education. The Wetlands Environmental Education Centre at Shortland is overseeing a three-year trial in which teachers at Callaghan College’s three campuses and at three feeder primary schools prepare curriculum material on climate change for Years 5 to 8.
The Rumbalara Environmental Education Centre has led Central Coast schools in being water-wise through a variety of water conservation and monitoring programs carried out in conjunction with all three levels of government;
Glendale East Public School’s successful rehabilitation of its creek has seen tadpoles return.
Callaghan College, Wallsend Campus and its feeder primary schools have had great success in the statewide Solar Car Challenge. Schools across the Region have also rainwater tanks connected to toilets and watering systems, some growing vegies for their canteens.
