Canadian High School Students Awarded Prizes for Environmental Projects

May 26, 2011 - In partnership with contest sponsor, Waste Management of Canada, ECO Canada is awarding four Canadian secondary schools with $2,000 each for submitting videos that focus on an environmental issue and related career choices. The winning teams are from the following schools:

• École Secondaire Lacombe Composite High School in Lacombe, Alberta
• École Secondaire Etienne-Brûlé in Toronto, Ontario
• Evan Hardy Collegiate Saskatoon in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and
• St. Mark Catholic High School in Manotick, Ontario

The funds received will go towards implementing environmentally friendly projects in each school.

The students involved will be focusing their efforts on a variety of issues, including composting organic waste and maintaining a community garden and greenhouse, turning environmental passion into a green career, reducing waste and improving a school’s recycling system, and eliminating single-use plastic water bottles.

“[The award] definitely empowers the students and makes them realize they have a voice. As a younger generation, they realize that if they do things in a mature fashion, they can make a change,” said Nancy-Anne Giroux, environmental teacher at St. Mark Catholic High School.

ECO Canada launched the ECO Action! Video Contest last year to encourage students to discover the careers tied to local environmental issues.

“These videos are an excellent demonstration of the changes that students can inspire when they take thoughtful action on current environmental issues,” said Grant Trump, CEO at ECO Canada. “We would be pleased if projects like these could lead to meaningful environmental careers for some of these students.”

“Waste Management is involved in numerous business and education partnerships, which provide innovative resources for environmental education to teachers and classes,” said Diane Kossman, Waste Management’s Communications Manager Western Canada. “Our goal is to be a trusted and valued community partner and we look for ways to partner with the communities we serve. We strongly support ECO Canada’s efforts to expose students to environmental issues while contributing to sustainability in Canadian communities, so we were happy to partner with them on the national video contest.”

The four winning submissions can be viewed online at www.eco.ca/videocontest
Visit ECO Canada’s website at www.eco.ca for more opportunities to get involved as a student or a teacher.

Thank you to Waste Management, a proud sponsor of the 2011 ECO Action! Video Contest