HI-VIS was added to the school uniform when the Upper Hunter Mining Dialogue’s School Mine Tours Program visited Glencore’s Liddell, Bulga and Glendell mines in September.
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Kitted out in reflective vests, a total of 154 Year 5 students and their teachers visited the three mines on four separate tours under the care of mine employees who acted as expert guides, explaining the processes of the mining operations, while touring the entire site by bus.
Schools taking part in the tours were Singleton Public, Mt Pleasant Public and Australian Christian College, Singleton.
It included stops at lookouts perched on the edge of the mine pits as well as travelling to nearby rehabilitated land where students learned how mined land was rehabilitated as the mine progresses.
The visits were part of the Dialogue’s School Mine Tours Program, which will see an estimated 1000 Year 5 and Year 9 students from Upper Hunter schools tour mine sites in 2018.
The program is scheduled to include 27 individual tours from 18 participating schools visiting 13 different mine sites across the region.
It also aims to offer a fact-based, first-hand educational experience to teach local students about the impacts and benefits of coal mining in the Upper Hunter.
The dialogue provides the free tours to all schools in the Singleton-Muswellbrook educational catchment and the program uses educational materials and messaging developed by a dialogue working group made up of teachers, community members and industry and local government representatives.