Blacktown City Council

Blacktown City Council (opens in a new window) offers a number of free 'Sustainable Living' workshops for residents, aimed at engaging the local community through interactive learning including biodiversity, food waste in addition to energy and water efficiencies tips.

Brewongle Environmental Education Centre

Brewongle Environmental Education Centre (opens in a new window) offers a wide range of environmental education and field work opportunities for students, teachers and the community to engage and learn a diverse range of fundamentals surrounding the environmental and aboriginal education.

The University of Western Sydney has collaborated with the Longneck Lagoon and Brewongle Environmental Education Centres to develop engaging academic enrichment programs for school students. To find out more please read UWS Environmental Education Collaborations (opens in a new window) (PDF, 405Kb)

Schools Engagement with UWS – HIE.

As part of a schools engagement strategy with the Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment at UWS we are co-developing a program to engage students in the climate change research facilities at the campus. We have created engaging short videos that students will watch before attending a day field trip to the research sites. We were very impressed with the interviewing skills of the academics we worked with and our own filming skills! We also had the opportunity to venture up in the cranes above the EucFACE site to view and film the incredible work being completed.

Students will partake in hands on experiments and data analysis as part of a field trip to the EucFACE, rainout shelters and whole tree chamber experiments. Students will be encouraged to document their learning using our ‘go pro’ cameras and worksheets. Our plan is to have these students link their learning to a global audience via the E-pals network.

Wild Adventure on the Hawkesbury River

Adventure Conservation is the theme of a project that is being developed in conjunction with Gibberagong Environmental Education Centre at Bobbin Head. We plan to engage a small cohort of high school students in an enriching and unique event that will involve kayaking, hiking, ecological monitoring, bush regeneration and a ‘race around the world’ style challenge with international linkages. The Hawkesbury River will be our focus and students will move from both ends of the catchment over three days by kayak, bus, boat and foot to study a keystone species (most likely a fish – Bass). This is intended to give students a ‘life changing’ experience and engage them with real life issues in conservation using outdoor activities as the ‘hook’. Watch this space as our program develops ready for delivery in Term 4.

Checking the Pulse of the Hawkesbury

Hawkesbury Environmental Network

Parramatta Climate Action Network

Nirimba Education Precinct - UWS College

Development of Pathways into University

In a recent audit by the Australian Universities Quality Agency (AUQA), UWS College was commended for its development of UWS College as a pathway for successful transition into university study for students from the Greater Western Sydney region.

The University of Western Sydney and Lithgow City Council have been cooperating for several years to secure a viable and sustainable University presence in Lithgow. This has been an integral component in the Council’s Community Strategic Plan and is consistent with the University’s commitment to access and equity in higher education.

The outreach campus at Lithgow will be managed by UWSCollege, a wholly-owned entity of the University, which has an established reputation for providing quality pathways to tertiary study and positive academic outcomes for its students.

The launch of a new program, Associate Degree in Creative Industries, creates further opportunity for UWSCollege to deliver professional higher education qualifications that are relevant to industry needs.

Penrith City Council

Penrith Sustainable Schools Program

Penrith City Council runs a number of initiatives and programs for local schools around sustainability. These include the Penrith Sustainable Schools Network (opens in a new window), the Penrith Sustainable Schools Hub on Council’s website (opens in a new window), the Sustainable Times newsletter (opens in a new window), and a range of engaging workshop activities for students (opens in a new window) covering topics such as waste, recycling, stormwater management and catchment health. Council also promotes a number of events to local schools such as Clean Up Australia Day, Earth Hour, National Tree Day and World Environment Day. These assist local schools to both make their schools more sustainable, but also incorporate sustainability into their students learning outcomes.

Love Food, Hate Waste

Penrith City Council has recently completed a food based education program for the local community called as part of the Love Food Hate Waste (opens in a new window) program. Council’s program, which was primarily funded by the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage, engaged local residents around the issues of food and sustainability. The main focus was to reduce the amount of food waste that households produce through menu planning and smarter shopping. The nature of the topic also meant that other important messages such as the advantages of fresh local produce, the health benefits of a balanced diet, and the financial savings when reducing food wastage could also be included in the program.

The activities held included cooking workshops and demonstrations with ex Masterchef contestant Jay Huxley (opens in a new window), kids kitchen gardening workshops, and menu planning workshops as well. Feedback from participants was highly positive, with most stating they would change their habits as a result of attending the program. Council has recently submitted an application for more funding to further their work in promoting this topic.

University of Western Sydney

Living Laboratory

The University of Western Sydney is creating a living laboratory for sustainability, with itself Hawkesbury Campus being a part of the master plan. This includes the significant UWS Hawkesbury Riverfarm (opens in a new window) site, which is being transformed into a unique outdoor living and learning laboratory that links land, food, culture and water for a range of educational purposes. The living laboratory has created significant media interest and is being featured as an example of good practice on the UN conference in Rio.

Education for Sustainability

Education for Sustainability (EfS) website is an internationally distinctive, searchable web based resource on Education for Sustainability that UWS and ALTC have shown national leadership in developing. The site covers the range of higher education approaches to program design, resources and support for EfS currently provided across all of Australia's universities. To find out more visit the Learning and Teaching Sustainability (opens in a new window) website.

Units of Study focused on Sustainability

UWS offers various units of study in social, cultural, economical and environmental sustainability, many of which include community based learning and projects. For example there are units of study and submajors which focus on Islamic Studies, corporate social responsibility, environmental law, green agriculture. For more information, please see UWS Course Units Focused on Sustainability (opens in new window) (PDF, 220Kb).

Unisteers

Western Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils

Water in The Landscape

• 18 creative events and activities, such as a short film competition and digital story telling together with music and dance performances;
• 5 local community forums and a celebratory regional summit;
• A dynamic interactive website and a photo competition which brings people together in appreciating and caring for the water in their environment.

Hawkesbury Harvest