Picking up after other people — usually parents are the ones picking up after their children, but on Friday January 23, Year 7 Curtis of the Bermuda High School spent the afternoon picking up after the grown-ups.

Every year all Year 7 students participate in a community project, and for the last few years this year group has 'adopted' the 'Waterville' property, headquarters of the Bermuda National Trust. Every couple of months they make an effort to get to 'Waterville' to help clean up the area and also spend a bit of time learning about Bermuda's flora. A group went to 'Waterville' on November 27th, 2008, and two other classes from the year group are scheduled to go in the upcoming months.

The students filed the following report:

When we arrived at 'Waterville', it seemed really nice and pretty. There were the flower beds, the mangroves, and the rose garden, but once we went underneath all that beauty of leaves, we saw that people don't treat the area fairly. What we saw will make us look at it from a different view; in fact, it changed our lives!

Down in the mangroves, there were old life vests, a sneaker, old candy bar rappers, old beer bottles and most of all, plastic. Quite a few bags of trash were collected, but we're not sure of the exact amount.

While at 'Waterville', we learned how to enjoy and take care of our environment so our children, grandchildren, and maybe even our great grandchildren can experience the natural wonders Bermuda has to offer.

We also learned about what is threatening our environment and how we can stop destroying our unique Bermuda ecosystem.

Did you know that if a fish gets caught in plastic that it wouldn't be able to get out and it would die?

One thing we definitely value is learning that even if you drop a candy wrapper it will get buried under the soil and hurt the environment. Please take care of our environment!

When we do this activity (picking up trash) we are helping the plants in Bermuda live and even the unique plants right now could be dying.

We could save so many more plants and animals if we each did our part. Cleaning up 'Waterville' has made us want to help Bermuda.

If we all went and did our part to help clean up Bermuda, the animals, people, and plants could live cleaner, healthier, happier lives.

The air would be cleaner, the ground would be litter-free, and we'd live our lives knowing that we helped save the environment. What will you do?

To make Bermuda a better place you can….

put your trash in the proper bins

pick up any trash you may see

bring your trash back on board if you're on a boat

refrain from throwing litter overboard

avoid getting bags when purchasing items

take your own bag when going to shops

reduce the amount of times you get fast food

cut your plastic six pack rings

reuse containers as much as possible (but not the store bought plastic water bottles)

turn off the lights when you leave the room

carpool as much as possible