The initiative, aimed at infant and primary schools, aims to promote environmental education in these centers
Benidorm announces the first competition to choose the most sustainable school garden in the city
Three prizes worth 500, 300 and 200 euros will be awarded for the purchase of educational or horticultural material
Benidorm City Council has invited all the city's Infant and Primary schools to a competition to award the most sustainable school garden, to promote environmental education and encourage the appearance and maintenance of these spaces in Benidorm's educational centres. The competition is organised by the Departments of Environment, Education and Employment, headed by Councillors Mónica Gómez and Maite Moreno, and will distribute a total of 1,000 euros in three prizes of 500, 300 and 200 euros, respectively, which the winning schools can use to purchase educational or horticultural material. In addition, special mentions may also be awarded to those projects that stand out in one of the specific evaluation criteria, such as sustainability or community participation, among others.
The local Government Board has today approved the rules for this ‘I Benidorm Sustainable School Garden Competition’, in which educational centres can register until 20 February by sending an email to the Department of the Environment (playasymedioambiente@benidorm.org) indicating the name of the centre, a brief description of the school garden and the details of the person responsible for it. To participate, schools must have an active garden at the time of registration and throughout the process, they will have advice and monthly activities from the students and teachers of the T’Avalem ‘Benidorm Sustainable’ Youth Guarantee employment-training programme, as the responsible councillors have announced.
To select the winning garden, participating centres must send a detailed report of the garden to the email address provided above before 26 May, with a maximum length of 10 pages, including photographs, a description of the project, and an explanation of the work carried out must also include an explanatory video of a maximum duration of 5 minutes showing the garden and describing the students' experiences.
To evaluate all the participating gardens, a jury made up of technicians from the areas of Environment, Education, Employment and Engineering will take into account criteria such as the Originality of the design, the creativity of the garden or the incorporation of innovative elements, which will be scored with a maximum of 20 points; Sustainability and Use of resources, such as the efficient use of water, recycled materials, organic farming techniques or composting, with a maximum score of 25 points; Participation and Collaboration of the Educational Community, involving students, teachers and families and promoting collaborative and environmental values, with a score of up to 20 points; Environmental Education and Dissemination, such as the implementation of training activities and pedagogical projects linked to the garden, such as workshops, talks or research work, with a score of up to 20 points; and, finally, the Diversity of Crops and Agricultural Techniques, which will have a maximum score of 15 points and where the variety of cultivated plants and the use of diverse cultivation techniques that respect the environment will be valued, as stated in the rules.
Regarding the competition calendar, Mónica Gómez and Maite Moreno have explained that registration will be open until February 20. Once registered, the participating centres can present the documentation for the jury's evaluation until May 26. Between May 27 and 30, the jury members will visit all the participating gardens. Finally, the awards ceremony will take place on June 3.
The Councillor for the Environment and Employment, Mónica Gómez, has invited all Infant and Primary schools to “participate in an initiative that we are sure will promote values such as caring for the environment, teamwork and collaboration among schoolchildren, placing environmental education and values among the priority objectives”. For her part, the person in charge of Education, Maite Moreno, has highlighted that the proposed activity “fits in very well with the projects of many schools in our city, which already have their gardens as an educational tool and which will now also have the incentive to participate in this competition”.
