FAQ

Most frequent questions and answers to the 100 Hives in 100 Schools project

What is it all About?

Little Star Bee Sanctuary’s vision is to create a holistic education and research community for the bee industry in Australia through change, transformation, and sustainability with integrity.

Over the past year we have been dreaming our vision into a reality. We are going to place 100 Hives in 100 Schools across the Mid North Coast of NSW.

The 100 Hives in 100 Schools project aims to raise the profile of Native Bees for future generations and highlight their value in terms of strategies for diversifying beekeeping in the agricultural and food industry, as well as increasing the numbers of Native Bees as a whole.

We are not just putting 100 Hives in 100 Schools, but creating a connection with each education environment through training nominated bee mentors, face-to-face education programs, the development of a digital learning platform and digital spaces for collaboration with other education environments and their Native Bee journeys. Data capturing to aid research and development will also be part of the program in each education environment.

We have partnered with some amazing people and organisations to produce a program that is supported in it’s field by a renowned entomologist – Dr Tim Heard from Sugarbag Bees.

 

What are the outcomes?

100 hives in 100 schools will:

  • Create the mind of enquiry in children and adults alike into their behaviour and characteristics – learners will be able to get up close and personal with the bees and find out about their fascinating social behaviours
  • Create educational resources for use in conjunction with the NSW curriculum to support learning in science, reading, writing, art, etc
  • Aid in the conservation and reproduction of Native Bees
    Pollinate school/ local gardens
  • Add a conversation point for teachers, colleagues, learners, staff and parents – a regular segment in the newsletter perhaps
  • Increase numbers of Native stingless bees (Tetragonula Carbonaria) on the Mid North Coast of NSW
  • Create data from placement and observation of hives – this can contribute to further study on Native Stingless bees in this region
  • Create and enhance a network of people passionate about Native Bees on the Mid North Coast of NSW

I want this is my school!

We still have host hive positions available in education environments across the Mid North Coast of NSW, however the first several rounds of hives (10 rounds in total) have been accounted for. Get in touch to find out more or to secure your place for subsequent rounds in the rollout of this project.

If you education environment is further afield we are taking interest from schools for possible future rollouts in your area. Again get in touch to register your interest.

Won’t Bees Sting?

This project is based on using Stingless Native Bees – Tetragonula carbonaria and being stingless…well…they do not sting, so are safe for environments with children.