Clean Water Clean Future

CONTEXTIrresponsible consumption of water can lead to a crisis that will affect billions of people in the future. With this reality in mind, we have taken on the mission to change the way in which people relate to water and we want to start inoculating this into the young minds of today that will become the adults of tomorrow. We want our pupils to turn the topic upside down and inside out, to learn about water as it used to be regarded by our ancestors, water and the way in which we consume it today and the effects of irresponsible consumption for the future of mankind. We want them to become active defenders and promoters of responsible water usage, to initiate local campaigns “Save the water for your children”, to analyse people’s behaviour towards water in their local communities and share them with our partners. Also, throughout the project, we want to investigate and come up with a plan to turn our schools into water-friendly schools and present it to local authorities, so that we can really make a difference in the end. OBJECTIVESO1. Increase knowledge about water from different perspectives – scientific, cultural, literary, artistic on most of the studentsO2. Raise students’ awareness of the importance of water for the humankind on most of the studentsO3. Help students identify general problems about water shortage and personalize them to their local contextO4. Foster students’ civic engagement in community problems related to ecology and strengthen the role of the school in the local communityO5. Develop students’ soft skills, creativity and cultural awarenessO6. Improve language skills O7. Improve water-friendly habits within the school facilities and amongst students/ families, helping this aim to expand.MAIN ACTIVITIESC1 – Water in the past - Art through literature, folktales, musicC2 – Water and health – Biology, PE perspectivesC3 – The Science of water – Geography, Maths, ScienceC4 – Water and the future – excessive consumption, pollution. Eco-campaignsC5 – Making our schools sustainable water consumers (joint-staff training event)Between the transnational events, students work on the topic of the exchanges, applying surveys and analyzing the, creating poems, paintings, posters, initiating local campaigns to raise awareness about water depletion to improve their school premises and turn it into a water-friendly school. They present all their work in online conferences on eTwinning.PARTICIPANTSPupils will be the main actors in local and transnational activities. The age range of the participants in exchanges is 12-15.96 students will be selected to participate in C1-C4, 6 students from each sending school/exchange. These pupils will be accompanied by 2 teachers.The profile of the accompanying teachers is related to the topic of each exchange.For C5, participants are 3 teachers from each school (a total of 12 teachers). These are the school principals, the coordinators and one project member who coordinates the Water Friendly School (WFS) plan and its sustainability.RESULTSThey create posters of the project, films about local water supplies, create maps of water sports facilities in their area, apply surveys and questionnaires on members of the local community to measure the consumption of water and observe the purpose of water consumption in households before and after the project, to measure its impact. They are involved in organization of local campaigns to raise people’s awareness about the effects of irresponsible water use, produce written advertisements, etc. Together with teachers, they identify inefficient water use in their schools, so that they can come up with solutions to make the school water-friendly.During exchanges, they attend lessons about water, are involved in physical activities (e.g. water sports), create artwork, songs and posters in multicultural groups, will go on field trips to take water samples and measure its drinkability.Toward the end of the project, teachers and students create a plan to turn the school into water-friendly environments.These plans will be presented by teachers during C5 in the final version, which will be presented to local authorities. and expanded to other schools through the already mentioned platforms.IMPACTSchools will gain a good reputation by involving the pupils and teachers in community problems and trying to raise awareness about local issues that can affect the quality of life.Schools will also set an example of eco-friendliness that we expect other schools to follow.The water problems are only one part of the environmental issues we are confronted with, so we can continue developing projects on these issues.Our institutions will become more welcoming to students, as we will be in the spotlight on the duration of the project.The fact that we have implemented an Erasmus+ project is like a quality label that we will take pride in.