Before…
Crossing my fingers all week for a dry morning obviously paid off and we had sunshine and blue skies for our litter pick yesterday morning! The primary 5 class at St Mary’s Primary, Coatbridge, had told me that there was a lot of litter in areas around their school that many of them walk through to get to school. After a discussion about why litter causes so many problems (unsightly, dangerous to humans and animals, fire risk, attracts vermin… the list goes on) the class decided they wanted to do something about it. So I set about organising litter pickers and gloves for 29 little pairs of hands and we arranged for the litter pick to take place on the morning of the 23rd of March.
Before…
Arriving at the school at 9.30 I was not prepared for their levels of enthusiasm on a Monday morning! Raring to go we headed outside, equipped ourselves with pickers, gloves and bin bags and set about the task in hand. In four groups we worked our way around the local roads, paths and open spaces collecting all manner of things.Some of the most interesting finds included a rusty tape measure, a couple of footballs and some underwear (to a group of 10 year olds, this was the most hilarious thing that had ever happened!) And, of course, all the usual suspects; glass bottles, crisp packets, metal drinks cans and plastic bags. The children had a great time and were disappointed that they were unable to get ALL the rubbish from EVERYWHERE! One girl asked me if I could arrange for a hedge to be cut down so she could go back and get all of the rubbish under the hedge that couldn’t be reached! The enthusiasm and commitment of the children was inspiring and the area was looking infinitely better by the time we had finished.
Primary 5 – St Mary’s Primary School, Coatbridge
Lots of full bags ready to be collected by the council
If you’re thinking about organising a clean-up I would highly recommend registering your litter pick with the ‘Clean up Scotland’ campaign run by Keep Scotland Beautiful. It’s free and easy and they send you lots of useful information about organising a litter pick, posters and stickers. You can also request some very stylish (and free!) yellow vests, beautifully modelled by the kids above, for all the pickers. They were a bit confused as to why I was asking them to ‘wear bin bags’ at the start but by the end they didn’t want to take them off!
So, why not give it a go? Organise a litter pick event and help Clean-Up Scotland!