"A journey towards full sustainability in the holistic spirit of integral ecology." Laudato Si' Action Platform
Our vision is to educate, inform and empower students and our entire College community to recognise that each of us have a moral responsibility (both personally and collectively) to care for creation and for each other. This responsibility to care for all creation drives us to action through knowledge and respect for the environment around us. Our commitment to sustainable practices is enriched by our understanding of integral ecology.
Sophia College is actively working towards inter-generational equality, ensuring future generations benefit from our efforts in engaging with sustainable practices such as:
- Recycling plastic bottles and cans.
- Collection of plastic lids of bottles for recycling.
- Soft plastics recycling bins in the staff room, and the yard to reduce soft plastics going to landfill.
- Battery and e-waste recycling in the staff room.
- White board marker refilling station in the staff room.
- Move towards eco-friendly compostable Bio Cups at college wide events.
- Embedding the cross-curriculum priority of sustainability in the Australian Curriculum into the school’s curriculum.
Laudato Si – with the subtitle On Care for Our Common Home is an inspirational letter, from Pope Francis, that calls us to examine our hearts, transform our social values and act for global solidarity. The encyclical captures the interconnectedness of social, economic and environmental justice in building and protecting our common home.
It highlights the ‘intimate relationship between the poor and the fragility of the planet’. Protecting the planet requires an integrated approach to combating poverty, restoring dignity to the excluded, and at the same time protecting nature.
As a school community inspired by Laudato Si’ Sophia College:
- values and explicitly teach the importance of connectivity to nature and local ecology.
- equips staff and students with age appropriate theological and moral understanding of the issues affecting our common home.
- continually evaluates and identifies how we can and will continue to care for our common home through faith inspired actions.
As Pope Francis has written, Ecological education can take place in a variety of settings: at school, in families, in the media, in catechesis and elsewhere. Good education plants seeds when we are young, and these continue to bear fruit throughout life. (Laudato Si’ #213)
Our Franciscan tradition is especially attuned to the message of Laudato Si’ in that the beautiful canticle composed by St Francis of Assisi reminds us that our common home is made up of all creatures forming one family of creation, deserving our respect, care and love.
© Brisbane Catholic Education, Sophia College (2025, 2023)