The final three schools of the 2022 Kreative Koalas – Design a Bright Future challenge have taken three different approaches to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and explored ways we can all contribute to a sustainable future. Let’s have a look at their koala artworks.

The students of Tarrawanna Public School tackled SDG 2: Zero Hunger as they created Mr T B Kind, a koala that brought together the whole school across multiple Key Learning Areas, with the theme of feeding the community.

Mr T B Kind is a mosaic koala inspired by the school environment using broken tiles, which were found as garden beds were prepared, to represent native animals such as cockatoos, bees and dragonflies. Mr T B Kind has a realistic mottled grey body and will be a striking and welcoming mascot to open classroom exhibitions.

“Our Koala created connections between our students, community and collaborators. The biggest and most exciting outcome was not only did the Kreative Koala initiative inspire Zero Hunger for community, but it has triggered special interest projects on sustainability across K-6 which we will be showcasing to community members.”

At Turvey Public School, near Wagga Wagga, students took a look at SDG 12: Sustainable Consumption and Production as they created Billy Barrandhang, a vibrant and detailed koala. Involving all classes across art, science and geography, Billy aimed to show:

“we all belong to one earth and we are all responsible for protecting its beauty”

Billy was created using ideas the students derived from Australia’s magnificent landscapes and natural features and is a celebration of a place to call home.

“Billy discretely embeds our entire school community and culture through the symbols painted on the koala. The flags in the ears of the koala represent each student and staff member to show our whole school approach towards sustainability and equality. The koala has our school core values written on the feet; resilience, responsibility and respect all which are integral to growing a healthy world. The crow wings are holding up the heart shape Earth on our koala making it unique because it symbolises our school totem and how the world’s future is in our hands.”

Warrawee Public School took Kreative Koalas literally and launched a campaign to Save The Koalas, naming their creation “Eila”.

“Children chose to call our art koala Eila after one of our sponsored koalas. Elia is a heroic koala who survived the Mambo wetlands fire in Port Stephens in December 2018 with a baby on her back and pregnant with another. The children see her as resilient and a hero for being able to escape the fires and then survive the treatment in Port Stephens hospital as she had badly burnt paws from climbing a burning tree.”

Students realised bushfires effect flora as well as fauna and as a result Eila is adorned with gum leaves, waratahs, kangaroo paw and wattle alongside native animals fleeing the smoke of the fire, which curls across Eila’s back. Indigenous designs illustrate a connection to Country and green represents renewal.

“The green of the gum represents the regeneration of the Australian bush and though it takes time the children felt this was important as life starts again and gives us hope for the plight of the koalas.”

Congratulations to all schools and students participating in the 2022 Kreative Koalas. Collectively students have explored a total of nine Sustainable Development Goals:

• SDG 2: Zero hunger
• SDG 3: Good Health and Well-being
• SDG 5: Gender Equality
• SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy
• SDG 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities
• SDG 12: Responsible Consumption and Production
• SDG 13: Climate Action
• SDG 14: Life Below Water
• SDG 15: Life on Land

Despite the challenges posed by a global pandemic, which meant the closing of schools and home learning for students, participants in the 2022 Kreative Koalas have risen to the occasion and come up with some fabulous Koala artworks. Let’s have a look at four schools who chose to focus on their own backyards as they cared for their local community and environment.

Ladysmith Public School, near Wagga Wagga, took a look at the presence and impact of salinity along their local Kyeamba Creek as they created the aptly named “Saltbush” while studying SDG 15: Life on Land.

“On our walking tour of some neighbouring farming land, we observed many trees that appeared to have died. These trees were on land that had previously been identified as a discharge site, where salinity had been a problem. One beautiful [dead] tree, became the focus of our artwork and we used this as the major design element on the back of the koala.”

Saltbush represents a personal journey for the students and community of Ladysmith, highlighting an environmental problem but also celebrating the beauty of their home. In bold colours Saltbush depicts the dead tree and Kyeamba Creek alongside the bright yellow of wattle and the blue/grey of the saltbush plant. White dots across the koala represent rising salt and how it infiltrates the soil.

Also inspired by SDG 15: Life on Land is “Warada” (the Darug name for Waratah), which symbolises resilience and renewal. Warada is the Kreative Koala creation from a group of Hawkesbury schools under the Centre of Excellence in Agricultural Education banner, which includes Kurmond, Bilpin, Windsor Park, Kurrajong, Kurrajong North, Kurrajong East, Wilberforce, Richmond North and Comleroy Road schools.

This wonderful collaborative effort has produced a koala that represents the benefits and beauty of local native flora, depicted on Warada as intricate black and white botanical designs with a stripe of blue representing the Hawkesbury River across his back and a brown seedling of renewal on his chest.

“[Warada is] a botanical journey following Bells Line of Road from Bilpin, through the Kurrajong area, across the Hawkesbury River down to the Castlereagh, Agnes Banks, and Windsor Downs nature reserves.”

Lake Albert Public School (near Wagga Wagga) had only to look out their school windows to derive inspiration from Lake Albert itself and they named their creation Barrandhang, which means koala in the local Wiradjuri language.

Barrandhang is a blue koala reflecting the connection between the students and the lake, with two limbs painted brown to express how the lake would look like with uncontrolled pollution. Striking orange/pink ears represent the sunsets the lake gifts to the students each day and across the body of the koala are detailed footprints representing local wildlife including duck, platypus, honeyant, goanna, frog, turtle,

, fish and possum. Coloured icons represent the school’s goals to recycle, reuse and reduce food waste.

“We are fortunate at Lake Albert Public School to be situated next to the lake and to be able to enjoy its beauty and wildlife every day. We couldn’t aim for a sustainable school environment without including our passion for a healthy and sustainable water environment.”

Also looking at their local waterways was Scots All Saints College from Bathurst who championed the plight of platypus that suffered a local extinction event during the last drought. The students chose SDG 13: Climate Change and used Biladurang (or Bill for short) to express this environmental problem in Winburndale River.

One side of Biladurang represents a robust and healthy ecosystem, the other side is fiery and dark to show the consequences of too little water being released from the dam to the river.  A giant platypus rides on his back and across his body are casuarina leaves, platypus and rakali (native water rat) habitat and insects. Bill is a thoughtful reflection of the local environment and the passion the students have to manage it (and platypus populations) in a sustainable way.

“We want to let people know that climate change is changing our planet, which forced local government to make a decision about the platypus [when] the council stopped releasing water from Winburndale Dam [during the drought]; so the rivulet dried up and we had a local extinction.”

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Congratulations to these four schools who have found passion and appreciation in their local environment and used Kreative Koalas as a vehicle to express their connection and to share their concerns with their communities.

#CreatingABetterWorldTogether #SDGs

With 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals to choose from it is no wonder our 2022 Kreative Koalas – Design a Bright Future primary schools explored a world of diversity. For example, just three schools in our Newcastle cluster investigated five different SDG:

• SDG 3: Good Health and Well-being
• SDG 5: Gender Equality
• SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy
• SDG 13: Climate Action
• SDG 15: Life on Land

Looking at SDG 15 and 13 to investigate the effects of fire were students from Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School who named their koala “Alinta”. Alinta illustrates the effects of both unmanaged bushfires and controlled cultural burns.

To show these contrasting fire regimes Alinta became a split-personality koala. Bright colours on Alinta’s back represent the destruction of out-of-control bushfires, while cooler colours represent regrowth after managed cultural burns. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students from Years 1-6 assisted in creating traditional art for inclusion on Alinta and the local Aboriginal community taught all the students about managing the land with fire.

“Our entire school community was positively impacted by our involvement in the Kreative Koala program. All students were educated about the negative impacts of out-of-control bush fires on our climate, communities and wildlife. Students are now armed with the knowledge of how we can take on Aboriginal ways of healing the land through fire and feel hopeful about the difference we can make.”

Looking at SDG 3 and 5 were students from St Joseph’s Primary School who designed a koala named, appropriately, Joseph (or Joey for short!). Involving Year 4 and 5 students across PDHPE, Mathematics, Science and English, Joseph represents sports and physical activities the students can participate in to remain healthy.

Joseph is resplendent in green and gold, Australia’s national sporting colours, and adorned with both the Australian and Aboriginal flags. Hand-drawn pictures across the koala represent the activities the students enjoy and the inclusion of the Olympic rings alludes to aspirations for the future.

“We used our love of different sports to create this original design and we showed the statue the same respect that we would for a living creature.”

Students from St Paul’s Primary School chose SDG 7 and created Kristie, the sustainability warrior,

“to promote energy saving tips, to demonstrate the most efficient forms of clean renewable energy and promote the work of climate activists Greta Thunberg and Pope Francis in our school and community”.

Kristie is a smart-looking environmental activist koala. She wears a hat featuring solar-powered fans and a shirt showcasing clean energy sources such as hydroelectric, wind, solar and geothermal. Images of traditional bush tucker remind us to take only what we need and Baiame, the creator, represents the knowledge we can learn from Aboriginal nations.

“We have given Kristie a shirt advertising climate action. We believe clothing is a great way to advertise and promote how to save energy. Greta [Thunberg] is currently going after fast fashion as a new initiative … [and we wanted] to support climate activists like Greta to keep governments accountable for their role in saving the environment.”

Congratulations to all schools in our Newcastle cluster for showcasing the diversity of the Sustainable Development Goals.

#CreatingBetterWorldTogether #SDGs

Three schools in our 2022 Kreative Koalas – Design a Bright Future challenge chose to use their fibreglass koalas to explore the benefits of bees in our world, and to highlight the challenges bees face. Interestingly , the study of bees incorporated multiple United Nations Sustainable Development Goals including SDG 2: Zero Hunger, SDG 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities, SDG 12: Responsible Consumption and Production, SDG 13: Climate Change, SDG 14: Life Below Water and SDG 15: Life on Land.

Let’s take a look at their bee-utiful creations.

Collaborating under the banner of the Centre of Excellence in Agricultural Education were students from three primary schools – Bilpin, Kurrajong East and Blue Mountains Steiner – who put their vivid imaginations together to produce a koala named “Ngalaya”.

“Ngalaya” is Darug for ally or friend in battle – fitting in our Koala who will assist us in educating students across NSW in how they protect the future for our pollinators.”

The honey-coloured Ngalaya features local native bees as alternatives to European honeybees and illustrates their habitat and honey production with 2D and 3D creations ranging from life-sized to macro. There is even a Fibonacci Sequence (mathematical sequence) that is so often replicated in nature.

“Our koala is unique because it is a means of demonstrating how native pollinators are essentially entwined with current and emerging sustainable agricultural practices in order to work towards guaranteeing future food security for Australia, and potentially the human race as a whole.”

Also on the bee-wagon were students from Hamilton Public School who created a bold yellow and black koala named “Clancy” to demonstrate the importance of bees to the ecosystem and food security.

“If we can put in place practices that protect bees in our own back yard, then the impact can permeate through the community and positively contribute toward achieving SDG 15, 2, 11 and 13.”

With motifs depicting beehives, antennas on his head and a pink rose in his mouth, Clancy is one smart-looking koala. Clancy will proudly stand in the school’s Blue Gate Garden, an established project that has been incorporated into previous Kreative Koala competitions, where he will be a symbol of sustainability and the pursuit of a better future.

The final school taking a deep-dive into the world of bees was St Brigid’s Primary School who designed “Girrga” (meaning native bee in the Gathang language). Girrga gives voice to the problems soft plastics present in the environment, the plight of local butterflies and bees and the challenges faced by bees by the current Varroa mite infestation.

As a result, Girrga is a vibrant koala with a bee for a nose, a giant butterfly across her back, and plastics on her limbs, surrounded by multi-coloured flower designs across her body.

“We really wanted to portray the bright and vibrant colours of country. The bees are on our koala’s toes to represent how they are currently missing in our environment due to the Varroa mite disaster.  We believe our koala is unique because not only does she represent the concern we have for the environment and local habitats due to wasteful packaging, but she also spotlights a current issue of the plight of bees in our local area.”

Thank you to all students who have shown us the value of bees in our communities and environment and their contribution to our future food security.

#SDGs #CreatingaBetterWorldTogether