Please note that this is an on-going project.
Project Description
All activities in the School are aimed at sustaining Good Health and Wellbeing (SDG3) in learning and teaching, research and community and consumer engagement. These activities engage our staff, students, clinical partners, researchers and research collaborators. We promote good health and wellbeing in all partnerships, involving consumers at every stage of our research, collaborating with education and health service providers and members of the community in curriculum development and delivery. Importantly, our internal team collaborations are aimed at achieving sustainability in the provision of our education programs as outlined below. It is our expectation that these examples of sustainable practices provide positive examples of the importance of the SDGs to our students and clinical partners.
Example: The School of Nursing and Midwifery Team (SoNM) Simulation and Practical Experience (SPE) Technical Partners Health (TPH) team share sustainability as a key value and initiative. Through hard work, commitment, and teamwork they notably contribute to Griffith University’s Sustainability Goals specifically to the goal of responsible consumption and production.
The SoNM SPE TPH team provide a high level of support to the School as they play a vital role in supporting the clinical skills and immersive simulation practical activities for two undergraduate programs: the Bachelor of Nursing (BN) and Bachelor of Midwifery (BMid), which have a combined enrolment ~3000 students across three campuses: Nathan, Logan and Gold Coast. The very large student numbers require the use of a large amount of simulation consumables and consequently, potential waste related to used consumables and their packaging.
Project Personnel and Beneficiaries
The SoNM SPE TPH team are an enthusiastic, engaging and committed team that care about sustainability and have great strategies in place to help Griffith University in their sustainability goals. This year to date the team have created $20,505.62 in cost savings for the School and prevented ~220 kg of waste going to landfill. Given most of these items are lightweight plastics, this reflects a huge volume of waste prevented from reaching landfill. They display continued commitment and passion to helping Griffith University reach its Sustainability goals through not only ensuring sustainable consumption and productions patterns (SDG 12) for the Bachelor of Nursing and Bachelor of Midwifery programs but through reaching out to others to help them achieve the same for their programs and continuing to seek further opportunities to contribute to the University’s sustainability goals.
Outcomes to Date
The Team have created a pledge, which has been built upon each year. In 2022 the team pledge to:
• Re-use as many plastic syringes, IV lines and bags for student use as possible
• Weigh plastics identified by each area that we agree to re-use to be able to demonstrate our commitment to the sustainability goal of Griffith University
• Choose greener options for our repackaging choices
• Write to companies regarding packaging choices and options
• Responsibly recycle e-waste
• Turn off lights and computers when not needed
• Take stairs not elevators when appropriate to do so
They have created a presentation for the wider TPH team to increase their awareness and encourage them to join them in the sustainability ventures. The presentation is titled “Planting the Seeds of Sustainability” – a great idea for growth and starting from a seed to grow into a forest. The team hope to inspire the wider TPH team to record their progress on re-use and recycling so they can build upon it each year.
Project Significance
Some degree of recycling has been taking place for over a decade, but the team continue to work together to create new and innovative strategies to increase sustainability in the labs by washing, drying and re-using many items that would otherwise go to landfill. The team are enthusiastic about new ideas and embrace change. Capturing and recording what is re-used and the associated savings was a new initiative introduced in 2019 and became everyday practice.
• Procedures were developed on the most efficient way to wash and dry the identified items to be re-used
• Instructions on how to repackage items, where applicable, were developed
• Containers and signage were created to separate the items
• A process for weighing the items was developed
• A spreadsheet to record re-used items was developed
• Education of students and teaching staff on what was being recycled for re-use (not thrown away) was undertaken, helping to bring sustainability awareness to the forefront of their minds.
Items recycled and re-used:
• Syringes: 10ml, 20ml, 30ml, 50ml, 60ml
• Intravenous lines: Gravity, Alaris, Bbraun
• Fluid bags: 100ml, 250ml, 500ml, 1000ml
• Other: glass vials, packaging, dressing packs
With up to 3000 students moving through the labs each year, often using multiples of the items listed above per lab the magnitude of the items recycled on a weekly basis is enormous.
Each Campus records (in kg) what they have washed, dried and ultimately reused. The data are used to create progress reports.
One Team member is representing the SoNM SPE TPH team at the TechNet conference being held at Monash University this year. They will give a presentation to showcase the team’s sustainability initiatives. They hope to both inspire others and spark conversation to create more ideas that could be implemented to improve upon the already well-established sustainability efforts of the SoNM TPH (SPE) team at Griffith University.