The Project Based Learning (PBL) competition is open to all full-time and part-time students at FE Colleges in Northern Ireland. Its aim to promote the development of critical and creative thinking and problem-solving skills among students.
Each of the six FE colleges hosted preliminary qualifying round with the highest scoring entry in each of the four categories - Entrepreneurial, Sustainability, Innovation and Social Impact – securing their spot at in the final at North West Regional College on May 23.
Green Hair spokesperson, Erin Kennedy from Stewartstown explained how their project developed:
“Hair is rich in natural nutrients but cut hair in salons is usually swept up and binned. Since only a minimal amount of long hair is ever recycled and used to make wigs, we decided to investigate how hair cuttings could be used to create an environmentally friendly sustainable product.
Erin continued: In our theory class, we were discussing the many benefits of hair and our lecturer, Victoria Smyth, mentioned how human hair could be used to keep foxes away from chickens.
With all four members of Green Hair coming from a farming background, they decided to investigate this further. To their delight, they discovered that not only did human hair keep foxes away, but the hens seemed happier!
“We approached a local farmer, George Newell and he agreed to us putting hair that we had gathered in the salon around the chicken coops, hoping that it would keep the foxes away.
When we went back a few weeks later, George said he hadn’t seen any foxes and will continue to put hair around the coops. Not only was the hair saving his chickens, but they were laying better and the grass is around the coops has also improved and is much greener.”
She continued: The hair keeps foxes away from the chickens as they get the scent of humans from the hair. They are tricked into thinking that a human is present, so they stay away and the chickens stay safe.”
Human hair contains three essential nutrients, nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium which are crucial for plant growth. As hair decomposes, the nutrients are slowly released into the soil, providing a natural and slow-release fertiliser for plants.
Erin explained that they also carried out a ‘hairy tomato’ experiment to illustrate other benefits of waste hair.
“We planted tomato seeds at the same time and to the same depth in the soil. They were watered at the same time every day and kept in sunlight and near heat in the same room.
The only variable was that we put hair on the top of half the plants.
“Within the first week, the hairy tomato plants were growing well but there was no sign of growth on the others. After four weeks, there was significant growth on the hairy plants which had longer with thicker stems compared to the plants with no hair so we expect to see tomatoes on the hairy plants first.”
She added: “It’s been fascinating to see first-hand the benefits of a free waste product and it has certainly made learning a lot more interesting.”
The other members of the Green Hair team are Lillie Stewart from Magherafelt, Ellie Parke, from Ballyronan and Jemma Newell from Cookstown.
Hairdressing lecturer Victoria Smyth said she was delighted how the students had enthusiastically embraced Project Based Learning (PBL):
“PBL is an increasingly popular teaching method as it focuses on preparing young people for employment by encouraging them to get involved in real-world projects to assist with developing their entrepreneurship skills.
“Not only is PBL very beneficial for students, but as the Green Hair team have discovered, it can be very enjoyable.
“The students are to be commended on their project and I wish them every success in the PBL finals.”