Kiama High School students have gone out to get their hands dirty today as part of their annual community tree planting program.

The school has been taking part in the program since the 1990s, sending students to various sites for the day to help plant trees with Council and community volunteers. This year's sites include Bombo Headland, Spring Creek, Seven Mile Beach, Shoalhaven Heads, Currys Mountain and Minnamurra Rainforest.

HSIE teacher, Paul Berry, who has coordinated the program for thirty years, says it gets the students focused on the environment.

“Instead of just learning it in the classroom and being told to plant more trees, this is the day we can actually do that,” Mr Berry says.

“It’s really good to see the students getting involved and basically leaving a legacy so they can come back to sites like this that have been going for over twenty years and see the forest that they were part of.

“It makes them more invested in the environment as they can actually see the rewards of their efforts.”

A generation of students have planted trees with Paul Berry

A member of the Bombo Headland Landcare group, Carl Glaister, says students have been coming there every year for the past decade.

As a result students may not only be seeing the forests their predecessors have helped create but the animals that have been provided with habitat, including at least one swamp wallaby.

“The variety of animals that come out here and use this habitat is amazing,” Mr Glaister says.

“Some of the trees we’re planting may be food for threatened species like the Glossy Black-Cockatoo - they're not here yet but they do fly up and down the coast so one day these students might come out here and see these beautiful birds and know they helped provide food for them.”

Mr Berry hopes that this program will inspire students to get involved in more types of community tree planting in the future.