Environmentally-friendly pupils have helped two schools scoop green awards.

St Luke’s Primary School in Brighton and Goldstone Primary School in Hove have picked up Eco-Schools Green Flag awards for their work in sustainability. Pupils of all ages have worked to transform their schools’ daily routines into ones that benefits the environment and saves the schools money.

Brighton and Hove now boasts 16 Green Flag schools, putting it in the top 10 of English Local Authorities. St Luke’s and Goldstone Primary schools join Downs Infants, Patcham High, Hangleton Juniors and Coldean Primary which received the award earlier in the school year.

Pupils, staff and parents in these schools have worked together on a wide range of eco projects such as reducing their school’s energy use, developing areas in the school grounds as havens for wildlife, reusing and recycling as much as possible and fundraising to install panels on the roof. Teachers have also ensured that eco topics are integrated into lessons such as maths, English, science and geography.

Members of the Eco Council at St Luke’s Primary were thrilled to receive their Green Flag at the end of term.

Naima, 11, who is looking forward to sharing her eco expertise at secondary school next year, said pupils could not have done it without the help of the whole school and especially Year 4 teacher Fiona Byrne.

She said: “If everybody does one thing, that helps a lot.

“So it’s not just us that should be proud of the Green Flag, it’s every child and every teacher.”

Her fellow councillor Hannah, eight, added: “The best thing was getting the whole school involved with ‘Eco’s Got Talent’ to raise money for our solar panels.

“And I loved decorating the compost bins to make composting our fruit peels more fun.”

Vania Seevaramen, eco co-ordinator at Goldstone Primary, said: “Achieving Green Flag status really was a very proud moment for all of us at Goldstone.”