We were delighted to be invited recently to visit Holy Spirit Catholic Academy in Sefton to lead a school assembly and hedge planting event with the pupils. The school had previously been involved with our Meadfleet Academy scheme when they participated in our school sunflower competition. The school staff have a very keen interest in the outdoors, and a school gardening group help the caretaker to plant shrubs and flowers in the school grounds.
Meadfleet’s Ecology and Conservation Manager Paul and Regional Manager Jake were welcomed to the school at the Monday morning assembly, and Paul presented an illustrated talk to educate pupils on the wide range of wildlife that uses urban areas, and the importance of such spaces as gardens, parks, communal areas and school grounds for nature. The children were very enthusiastic and provided some great input and questions for our team.
Following the assembly we all moved outside to the school field to plant a new hedgerow. Meadfleet provided a mix of native hedge plants and the pupils helped Paul and Jake to plant the new hedge along the perimeter of the school field, connecting two areas of mature trees. Every pupil got the chance to plant at least one tree each, and were fully engaged in the project – some even named their trees and are looking forward to seeing them grow into a green hedge. As well as screening the boundary fence and adjacent road the hedgerow will provide nectar and berries as a food source for wildlife, and shelter, nesting, rooting and commuting habitat for a variety of out native species.
Following the visit, the school left us a lovely review:
“We’re a Primary School in Sefton and Meadfleet have been fantastic in providing information and resources for our outdoor provision, including seeds and prizes for our sunflower growing competition. The children enjoyed a recent visit from Meadfleet who joined our assembly to share their knowledge and talk about wildlife in our local area and what we can do to help it. This was followed by an activity where children were supported by the team in planting 100 saplings to grow a hedge in our forest school, all of which were kindly donated by Meadfleet“.
If you would like to nominate a local school in your area for a Meadfleet Academy visit then please contact us at academy@meadfleet.co.uk. Our team are able to give educational talks and sessions to suit a variety of age groups covering nature, ecology, and other environmental issues, and we can help with improvements to school grounds to encourage local biodiversity and enthuse children to take an interest in the great outdoors.
About Meadfleet
Meadfleet are a leading sustainable land-adopting management company. We have in-house ecologists with expertise in the BNG metric and are already applying the principles of Biodiversity Net Gain across our existing open space portfolio in England and Wales. Established in 1995, Meadfleet manage over 330 developments and 42,000 residential properties in our portfolio, with a strong balance sheet.
Meadfleet offers management of Biodiversity Net Gain delivery both on a managed development and on offsite areas, either via customer contributions or commuted sums. Our adoption model relieves developers of ongoing liabilities and management costs.
The Meadfleet model removes onerous liabilities from homeowners yet still encourages their input and engagement into the management of their local environment. We are committed to providing an excellent service to residents as demonstrated by our Excellent rating on Trustpilot and are members of The Property Ombudsman Scheme (TPOS), offering customers free, independent redress should they feel it is required. We are happy to work with residents groups and positively encourage the creation of these on the developments we are involved with. We believe this opens an effective two-way dialogue between homeowners and ourselves.
As a land-adopting management company, Meadfleet take long-term responsibility of open space, building customer and community relations and implementing perpetual management and improvement plans. We take a holistic and independent approach to managing areas of open space for the benefit of all residents, biodiversity and the wider environment.