We will start by holding a special Assembly where we will discuss the issue of circular and sustainable textiles and provide information to the students about the environmental and social impact of textiles and the textile industry as well as practical ways how we can reuse and upcycle clothes.

Then we will hold a whole school activity where students bring unwanted items of clothing and use them to create Christmas gifts for their families. These gifts will be taken home against a donation of €1. The collected donations will be used to buy a Children’s Dream (Children’s Dreams is an independent initiative working in collaboration with the Foundation for Social Welfare Services, which sees that children who live in children’s homes and who come from families who face social and financial difficulties get the Christmas present that they have been dreaming of). To create the gifts the students will use materials such as cereal boxes, plastic bottles/milk cartons as well as decorative items such as buttons or beads from unwanted clothes or accessories. No new items will be used to create these gifts.

Any clothing which is not used for this activity will be sent back to the children’s families and they will be encouraged to donate the clothes to charity or to hand them down to someone younger who can fit the clothes.