Watten Takes On Waste
The Highland Council Planning and Development’s local countryside ranger and Watten Community Council have come together with Watten Primary School to organise a Waste and Litter awareness raising exercise with the youngsters.
The Community Council identified litter and waste as a continuing problem in Watten and the surrounding area and approached the countryside ranger to help implement awareness raising with the local school children.
The nursery children and each class at Watten primary school took part in workshops organised by the countryside ranger to help raise awareness about the problems of waste and what can be done to help reduce the over all problem. The children took part in a range of activities including recycling games, time lines and learnt about the dangers of litter to wildlife in the countryside.
After the workshops, the school children were invited to enter a poster competition, with prizes sponsored by the Watten Community Council, to demonstrate the problems of litter and what everyone can do to help minimise waste. The winning posters will be displayed through out the village with the intention to raise awareness amongst other local resident.
Photographed were the winners and runners up of the competition during the prize giving ceremony on Friday 3rd November.
Primary 1 & 2 winner was Ellie James, runner up Gareth Cummings. P3/5 1st prize went to Lucy Brass and 2nd prize to Vicky Smith. Caitlin Calder took 1st prize in the P6/7 category and runner up was Gillian Campbell. Special prizes were also awarded to David Thompson, George Holmes and Rachel Smith for portraying a strong wildlife theme in their poster designs.
Marina Swanson, East Caithness ranger and workshop organiser said:
“Through the school children, we hope a positive message about waste and litter will eventually penetrate the wider community and reduce many of the problems we are seeing today. The children were all actively involved in the workshops and produced wonderful posters promoting very important messages. A great deal of effort and thought has gone into the design and production of all the posters and I hope they will be enjoyed by the local community.”
Sheena Waters from the Watten Community Council said:
“We would like to give our thanks to Marina and the school for their involvement in the project and especially the children for their interest and for making all the superb posters. The Watten Brownies have also given a great contribution to the village by doing s sponsored ‘Village Clean Up Challenge’”.
The Highland Council Planning and Development’s Countryside Rangers are supported by Scottish Natural Heritage.