Young NZ reporters have a chance to be recognised

Young New Zealand reporters are given the chance to be internationally recognised for their environmental reporting skills

Keep New Zealand Beautiful (KNZB) is excited to have announced the winners of the 2017 Young Reporters for the Environment – Litter Less Competition.

“Young Reporters For The Environment” (YRE) was established by “The Foundation for Environmental Education” (FEE) in 1994. Over the past 20+ years FEE has established a portfolio of core environmental programmes across the world such as Learning About Forests, Green Key, Blue Flag and the Young Reporters For The Environment.

In its 23rd year YRE is a youth-led environmental programme found in over 30 countries with more than 77,000 young reporters. The YRE Litter Less Campaign is sponsored internationally by Wrigley Company Foundation and encourages students to focus on environmental issues relating to litter. YRE gives young people the opportunity to be part of the solution by producing creative and engaging environmental journalism.

Open to 11-18 year old students in NZ, Education Manager Christine White said they ran the YRE Litter Less Campaign exclusively in participating schools this year and were very impressed with the enthusiasm and engagement of students as they worked on their projects.

“Litter is an effective theme for introducing children to environmental issues and it is often the most visual issue in a community, making it easier to see positive effects. The YRE Litter Less Campaign aims to affect long term behavior change among young people by increasing student knowledge in preventing and managing litter and waste and encouraging them to explore environmental issues further”.

To enter, students were asked to investigate an issue relating to litter, research a solution and then report on it using film, photography or writing. They were then required to disseminate their piece via available channels. This could be via their school newsletter, in a class presentation or by contacting local media.

The NZ YRE Jury was composed of experts in the fields of journalism, photography and environmental Sustainable Development. The members are Melissa Davies, TV Journalist; Jacki Key, Environmental Photographer; Malcolm Rands, EcoStore Founder and Amanda Reiss, Wrigley Pacific. The Jury decided on this year’s YRE National Winners who will receive a place in the National YRE Winners Workshop which will be held at The University of Auckland in November

Jury member, Amanda Reiss from Wrigley Pacific said “All the children who engaged in this year’s competition can be very proud of their entries. They inspire all of us to think about how we can make small changes to our own behaviour to help protect the environment for future generations.”

KNZB will put forward all First Place winners to be considered for the international competition which will be held early next year.

Keep New Zealand Beautiful are now taking expressions of interest from schools who would like to find out more about taking part in the Young Reporters For The Environment, Litter Less Campaign in 2018. Entries open in Term 1, 2018 and close in Term 3, 2018.

ENDS

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