Blooming Schools
Blooming Schools is an EU-funded project implemented in 4 European countries: Greece, Portugal, Malta, and Romania. It wishes to bring a touch of green activism into schools and to the children frequenting them by investing in the creation of wildlife gardens on the schools’ grounds, where those are absent, to be used as a learning environment, as a way to promote integrated learning.
This project is led by a consortium of 7 partners – BirdLife Malta, Portuguese Society for the Study of Birds, Friends of the Earth, Hellenic Ornithological Society, Agrupamento de Escolas de Portela e Moscavide, St Nicholas College Dingli Secondary, and Station Europe. Blooming Schools integrates Vlogging Academy for Sustainability – a modular hub created by Station Europe for young people who want to become content creators – using social media elements to raise awareness of problems that they care about.
The project is based on the idea that young people have a better understanding of a subject when they use their 5 senses and consists of a bottom-up approach, involving pupils of secondary school (13-18 years old). By creating these wildlife gardens, we wish to give practical information to young people and teachers on what they can do, in order to save and restore biodiversity. We seek to give young people the right tools, competencies and skills to become changemakers.
The project’s objective is to improve biodiversity and to give young people in secondary schools the right tools, competences and skills to become environmental change-makers, raise awareness and take action with a dutiful approach. To achieve this, we formed this great partnership between schools, environmental NGOs and a youth organisation.
The project partners
Blooming Schools is led by BirdLife Malta in partnership with Friends of the Earth Malta, St Nicholas College Dingli Secondary, Sociedade Portuguesa para o Estudo das Aves (SPEA, BirdLife Portugal), Agrupamento de Escolas de Portela e Moscavide in Portugal, Hellenic Ornithological Society (HOS, BirdLife Greece) and Station Europe in Romania.
Here is a series of actions and resources the partners are working on:
Creating wildlife gardens in schools, accompanied by a step-by-step manual that everyone can use to improve green spaces in their communities
“A garden for wildlife is one that is created with the aim of attracting and supporting native wildlife in all forms. In schools, wildlife gardens are good places for students to connect with nature, actively engaging with nature during lessons, or passively just simply enjoying time in the garden.”
Check out this video about the process of creating a wildlife gardens and the schools’ involvement.
A series of activities in secondary schools connected with the Sustainable Development Goals and using a STEAM approach
You can get started by assessing your schools grounds using these surveys!
- Online module for teachers
If you want to learn how to observe nature and create your own nature-based lessons, you can take this 90-minute online course. It will teach you how to use nature as a medium for delivering curriculum without harming the environment. This course is ideal for primary teachers, but secondary teachers can also benefit from it to become more comfortable with incorporating nature into their teaching.
Strategy to engage students with ENGOs
We want to provide continuous opportunities for young people interested in nature, who want to use their time to volunteer for environmental NGOs. We are aiming to strengthen our strategy to engage students in secondary and post-secondary schools to join our Falko youth group at early stages.
Vlogging academy for sustainability
Check out what our young participants created during the youth exchange in Romania under the guidance of Station Europe in a fun, informative and interactive way.
You can also watch all the videos made by youth and some tips about wildlife gardens and nature here.