Tea by the Sea — the first zero-waste school event in Nelson

On March 5^th, Clifton Terrace School in Nelson hosted their annual fundraiser “Tea by the Sea”; a convivial event on a beautiful, calm, summer’s evening. This year’s event was the biggest one so far and raised an enormous $10,000. This event was a significant one---the very first zero-waste school event in Nelson. 

Petra Fidler, a parent at the school had noticed how much waste was still created at the previous year’s event, despite there being recycling bins in place and buckets for food scraps to be fed to the pig. She knew that the children at school were no longer making any rubbish: they were recycling paper and card, putting food scraps in their worm farm, pig bin and compost, and taking lunchbox wrappings home. So a zero-waste event seemed the next logical step.

Petra spoke to the Home and School committee who were organising the fundraiser and easily gained their support. Rob Wemyss the Principal thought the waste-free idea was great.

With the school on board, Petra worked out a plan. She approached Waste Education Services for advice and bought a pile of ceramic plates from the Nelson Recycle Centre. She borrowed the events recycling kit, including bins and labels, from the Nelson City Council and talked with Andy Williams, a contractor for the council’s Festivals Team,who has managed the waste at several community events. Andy has worked extensively with food vendors, moving them towards biodegradable and ‘Bring Your Own Container’ (BYOC) options.  He believesthat people keep an area tidy if it looks nice. “You don't leave rubbish in your living room” is his concept. 

Petra took his advice to heart and, instead of creating a “rubbish bin” area for the school fundraiser, labeled the area “RETURNS”, and laid the recycling bins on a blue cloth decorated with seashells and driftwood to give the impression of a beach,. This attractive area, in keeping with the "Tea by the Sea" theme, prompted a lot of positive feedback. The kids really liked it, too.

The message was “Pack in, Pack Out”: families were asked to bring their own cups, plates and cutlery and to take all their rubbish home. For those who forgot, ceramic plates and cups from the school kitchen were available, and these could be returned for washing. The plates are now stored at the council for use by other schools.  Recycling bins were provided for glass and cans.

About 75% of the people brought their own dishes, which was a huge success for a first time. Everyone seemed okay with the idea of the extra effort for a good cause. “It’s no hassle at all to bring your own plates and cups”, said one family as they tucked into their delicious meal al fresco. Some people said they had initially doubted the whole idea but had to admit that it was definitely worthwhile and very well organised.

The returns area was well used and kept tidy during the whole event, although it definitely paid to have someone keeping a bit of an eye on it! Interestingly, the kids automatically separated their waste without a second thought, some really enjoying squashing their cans, while many of the adults approached hesitantly and took a while to find the correct bin. There were the odd few rebels who chucked a handful of rubbish into the general direction of the bins, but this only occurred a couple of times. And Petra just quickly tidied it up.

The only problem was caused by the milkshake machine, which could only take plastic-lined paper cups. These were collected for re-use as seedling pots in the school’s food gardens, along with the biodegradable plastic cups provided for wine, and the wooden forks, which would serve as seedling labels. However, by Monday morning the milkshake cups, which had been nicely stacked for re-use, had disappeared. Petra later found them in the school skip and has to admit that by that stage they were disgusting, smelling of rotten milk and all soggy. Even she could not get motivated to get them out anymore.  So this is something to look at next time if the school event is to be 100% waste-free.

Another interesting aspect was that after the event the grounds were actually tidy! People did take their rubbish home and didn't just leave it where it was. In total, only half a rubbish bag was collected for the landfill. Not bad for an event of this size!

Says Petra: “It went really well—we'll definitely do it again next time!”

For more information on how to run a zero-waste event at your school, click here