Welcome to our 2025 Student Leadership Team!

It was with great excitement that we welcomed our 2025 Year 2 to 4 Student Leaders to the KGT team at the end of February. We were thrilled to see both new faces and some familiar ones joining us this year. The following week the Year 5 to 13 students joined the fun, despite the rain! Altogether, we now have over 100 enthusiastic students who are eager to learn and do their part for the environment. With such passionate young environmentalists, we’re already feeling that this year is going to be amazing.

We kicked off the year with a trip around Spa Park, where we introduced the new student leaders to the incredible work done by previous leaders and gave them a sneak peek of the exciting projects they’ll be involved in throughout the year. We can’t wait to see them get started—let’s go, 2025!

It’s been wonderful seeing students return year after year, and just as exciting to see new faces who are eager to join the team. Since we have so many veteran students this year, we thought it would be fun to test their knowledge with a little game. The challenge was to find pictures of native trees and match them with their names. To make it more interesting, the stories behind the trees were given as clues, but the students still had to dig deep into the knowledge they’ve gained over the years. It was fantastic to see how many of our seasoned students were able to quickly identify our native plants and share that knowledge with the newcomers.

Recently, we gathered the whole SLT team together (over 100 students!) and held an afternoon of nature themed activities in the sun at the Waipahihi Botanical Reserve. These included trialling new games and topics on rotation like a Bug Hunt Picture Relay, and our first invasive clams session with our new game ‘Kākahi vs Clam’. There was also an introduced predators session with Ecological Bullrush and a 'getting to know you' trust excercise being blind folded and led through an obstacle course. We then invited the students families to return for a picnic dinner - it is a great chance to connect with other whānau and join the wider KGT community together. The evening was finished off with more games, fresh fruit for dessert and of course a well deserved ice-cream or two!

We’re already feeling the energy and enthusiasm from our student leaders, and we’re sure this year is going to be full of learning, growth, and meaningful contributions to our environment. Here’s to a fantastic 2025!