3rd March, 2016

It’s Fairtrade Fortnight!

This Fairtrade Fortnight, schools up and down the country have been getting involved, holding assemblies, visiting conferences, and of course having fun hosting their very own Fairtrade Breakfast events. Here’s just a tiny taster of what schools having been telling us! Don’t forget you can let us know what your school is up to schools@fairtrade.org.uk or @FairtradeUKEd and next week your activities might feature on our website.

This group of students from Trowbridge schools got the most votes for their idea at the Southwest Fairtrade Schools conference

Honley High School with Alison Thewliss MP at Parliament in London

Everyone enjoyed meeting Anna Maria from Nicaragua at the Southwest Fairtrade schools conference

On Monday, Barnes Wallis Academy in Lincolnshire had a staff Fairtrade bake off, while The Leys School in Cambridge started driving not one but two social media campaigns. #FairtradeShelfie asks people to tweet a photo of their bookshelf for World Book Day, showing their books about food, ethics and trade, and #FairtradeHaiku, all about creating short poems based on the Japanese tradition. Our favourite so far is this one from Holme Valley Fairtrade:

Students on a train – With banana suits and more! – Fairtrade adventures

They created this on their way down from Yorkshire to visit Parliament in London on Tuesday, along with students from the Honley High School Fairtrade Forum. The young people spoke with MPs, Fairtrade farmers and Fairtrade Foundation. The school tweeted, “we’re very proud of our Fairtrade Forum, fantastic ambassadors for the school.” Well done Honley High School!

On Wednesday, 100 pupils and teachers from 25 schools across the Southwest got together for a conference at Bristol Airport and met Anna Maria, a coffee farmer from Nicaragua. She talked about how getting involved with Fairtrade had helped her learn to read and write, put electricity in her house, and made her confident enough to travel far away from her home. Everyone also found out more about how Bristol airport is working on sustainability from Laura, their sustainability officer, and Fraser from Natural Beverages talked about what it’s like to set up a fair trade business.

The groups then shared their best ideas and experiences of events to focus on Fairtrade, and voted for their favourites. The group from West Pennard Primary School from Somerset shared their ideas from a Fairtrade tea party with games, cakes and the whole community involved.

The eco-club from May Park Primary School in Bristol decided to run an event for parents, with Fairtrade coffee. “The eco-club will attend to tell people why we should buy Fairtrade,” one of the pupils said.

But a group from Trowbridge Youth Parliament – St John’s Catholic Primary School, Holbrooke Primary School and North Bradley CE Primary School – won the most votes. They thought they should have a canteen menu noticeboard, with a weekly focus on Fairtrade. “The menu will have the Fairtrade logo as a regular reminder”, they decided, “with the food menu emphasising the use of Fairtrade ingredients as well as promoting healthy fruit options. Fairtrade fruit will always be available from the school tuck shop.”

Ysgol Emmanuel in Denbighshire, Wales have been celebrating Fairtrade Fortnight by hearing Pablo the Super Banana’s story, while Clavering Primary School in Hartlepool created a display about Fairtrade based on students’ writing.

Learners at Balshaw’s High School in Leyland, Lancashire have been tasting Fairtrade hot chocolate while creating tweets in support of Fairtrade, telling the world what they do to support farmers across the world.

Whatever you’ve got planned for Fairtrade Fortnight, your school could win an award for all the hard work. Find out more here.