Tree Planting with your Local School
that every child should have the chance to plant a tree. It’s the most ambitious children’s tree planting project ever in the UK: over the next 5 years it wants to help over one million children plant 12 million trees! See www.treeforall.org.uk for more information and all the details. The community of The Druid Network wants to support this project financially and practically, and we need your help to do it.
- Do you have children?
- Do you work in a school?
- Do you live near a school?
We are urging TDN members to find out if their local school is involved in the Tree For All project. If they are not, we want you to tell them about it and encourage them to get involved!
The Tree for All project is funded by a variety of companies. For every £40 each organisation gives, the Woodland Trust gives a school a pack of 30 saplings to plant in the school grounds. The Druid Network are becoming one of the sponsors of the Tree For All project. For every school which you get involved The Druid Network will give the Woodland Trust £40 to sponsor a pack of trees.
If you are involved in a youth group of any kind you can also encourage them to get involved. Youth groups have the chance to order the trees, but the funding for youth groups is time limited and the offer is open for 2007 only. The trees will be delivered by post to the youth clubs in November 2007, in time for the planting season. For more information check out the website www.treeforall.org.uk/JoinIn
As Druids, its easy to see why we would also want to support this project.
Druids are lovers of trees. We listen to our ancestors and we strive for honourable relationships with the world around us. Historically we were deeply involved in our communities as advisors, priests and teachers. Many of those roles are still valid today, but living in communities with radically different structures to the communities of old, it can be hard to know how to be involved with your community.
This is one of the ways you can get involved with your community. By helping your local school to have more trees in its grounds you are providing a wonderful experience for the children who plant the trees, you are creating a sacred space for the trees, allowing them to thrive, you are improving the health of the school and local area, improving the area for wildlife and you are building a valuable relationship between yourself and the community.
There are so many reasons to support this project. From a desire to integrate your craft with serving your community, to improving the environment, to soothing your conscience with tree planting. Whatever the intention, please test your courage and give this a try. It's only a phone call.
There is two ways you can help your local school get involved. The ‘hands on’ for those who want to get involved and help the school plant trees OR ‘hands off’ for those without the time or inclination to visit the school. We tested both methods with schools we had no previous contact with, to create the guidelines below.