Environmental Education for Schools
This policy supports effective environmental education programs in NSW public schools, provides guidelines on managing school resources in accordance with ecological sustainability and is a starting point for addressing global environmental issues.
Changes since previous version
2020 Aug 12 - updated contact details.
Document history
Updated contact details and made minor style changes.
The imperative statements of the 2001 version of the policy have been included in the present policy statement.
The 2001 Environmental Education Policy for Schools replaced the 1989 Environmental Education Curriculum Statement K-12. Implementation of the 2001 policy has been mandatory for all NSW public schools since Term 1 2002.
Superseded documents
This is a reformatted version of the 2001 Environmental Education Policy for Schools document, which replaced the Environmental Education Curriculum Statement K-12 released in 1989.
- Policy statement
- All schools will develop and implement a school environment management plan that is meaningful to the whole school community and is evaluated at regular intervals.
- The school environment management plan should:
- be incorporated into the whole-school plan
- link school administration and management with curriculum plans
- be organised under the three focus areas of curriculum, resource and grounds management.
- Audience and applicability
- Principals and school communities.
- Context
- Environmental education is based on the principles of ecologically sustainable development legislated in the NSW Protection of the Environment Administration Act 1991.
- Responsibilities and delegations
- The principal is responsible for the development and implementation of a school environmental management plan.
- Monitoring and review
- Principals and school communities should evaluate and monitor the effectiveness of their school environmental management plan at regular intervals.
- The Director, Early Learning and Primary Education will monitor the implementation of this policy and will report, as required, to the Executive.
- Contact
Director, Early Learning and Primary Education
02 7814 2756