Engineers Without Borders' Wind Turbine

Greeener Living Assistant, Tim Allen, has been doing a fantasic job at bringing staff and students together to promote sustainable living at The University of Sheffield. Here, he details the successes of the universities’ recent Ethical and Environmental Knowledge (EEK)Week:

 EEK Week 2010 was a great success at the University of Sheffield. While occasionally knocked by the looming May exams, turnout was solid for the week’s events with around 300 people attending the Big Green Fair and Travel Roadshow alone. There were events with a serious message such as film showings about Peak Oil and a debate between FairTrade and the Rainforest Alliance. These allied with more light-hearted activites like bike-powered smoothie making and a giveaway of fresh rhubarb on Monday which led to a lot of students sporting them as very organic-looking umbrellas! Such resourcefulness is to be applauded!

 This year’s EEK Week was on a bigger scale than ever before, thanks in large part to Degrees Cooler’s focus on bringing together students and staff towards a common goal. As Greener Living Assistant I was in a position to liaise effectively between the Ethical and Environmental student committee and the Energy and Environment Team of staff, which led to increased coordination between the two groups. The Travel Roadshow, RecFest (summer festival in halls with a recycling message) and Engineers Without Borders wind turbine (the group built an impressive five-foot wind turbine and aim to use it to generate power on campus) were all great but separate projects which, thanks to the uniting factor of Degrees Cooler, came together for the first time in EEK Week.

 So, looking back, we’ve had a fun week, learned some lessons for next year, and most importantly have used EEK Week to unite a wide coalition of like-minded students and staff. I very much hope the the effects of this to prove powerful and long-lasting.

Sharing good practice within and between univerisites

Making a Difference through Peer to Peer Persuasion
The Student Switch Off energy saving competition has been going from strength to strength and through recruiting students in halls of residence as so called Eco-Power Rangers – who pledge to use their energy more carefully and encourage their peers to do the same – and through various through film screenings, quizzes and photo competitions, the project has really engaged with a wide range of students. Definitely not just the usual suspects.

People often argue that small individual changes don’t make a significant different when it comes to tackling climate change, but with over 15% of all students in participating halls signed up as Eco Power Rangers, and average energy savings of over 9.3% to date, the Student Switch Off proves that if done collectively, every little does help.

Creativity for Sustainable Living

Creative awareness raising

Local People and Planet groups have been busy raising awareness around the four Degrees Cooler behaviours, by organising creative engagement activities during Go Green Week. From recycled fashion shows, to swap shops, to “Meat Free Mondays”, green graffiti installations and carbon speed dating events, Going Greener has provided staff and students with an amazing variety of ways to get involved.

Greening Departments from the Bottom Up
The EAUC’s Green Impact project provides the important link for staff to get involved in Degrees Cooler. Green Impact is based on the tried and tested Sound Impact Awards which has been adapted to get university staff to work together in teams to green their departments from the bottom up. Over 10,000 staff in over 250 departments are taking part in Green Impact this year, helping universities to lead by example and make the more sustainable option the easy and desirable option.

Since the Degrees Cooler programme began at the start of the academic year, students and staff at 20 universities across England have really thrown themselves into NUS’s exciting 2 year behaviour change programme.

The success of the project and enthusiasm with which staff and students have engaged in promoting behaviour change through peer to peer communication is highlighted in this inspiring short film that the Degrees Cooler team have recently produced. The film was showcased at the EAUC (Environmental Association of Universities and Colleges) Annual Conference last week, where behaviour change was the hot topic of the day, with delegates really keen to learn from each other and share good practice.

Click here, to see the film and how the 3 interrelated behaviour change projects (Student Switch Off, Going Greener, and Green Impact) which make up Degrees Cooler have all been making impressive progress across the four behaviours that the programme aims to positively impact upon; recycling more, saving energy, eating local sustainable food and reducing flying.

The campaign is working with both staff and students to help increase recycling awareness by bringing a fun yet serious message to Go Green Week.

The Can Film Festival was launched at London South Bank University and has subsequently been held across the country at other Degrees Cooler participating universities.

Rick Hindley of Every Can Counts said: “Of the eight billion drink cans sold in the UK each year, around half still end up in landfill. We can still dramatically improve on these figures if we focus on recycling outside of the home. Degrees Cooler offers us a fantastic opportunity to expand Every Can Counts and engage with a very important audience.

Mervyn Jones, manufacturing programme manager at WRAP, added: “Today’s students are very much the leaders of tomorrow. Awareness of importance of recycling amongst this demographic is gradually increasing and programmes like Degrees Cooler and Every Can Counts help to turn this awareness into action.”

You can view the video here.

Student Switch Off encourages students to be more aware of their environment and to find ways of reducing their energy use. Reduction in electricy usage will be measured in each building and the winning halls will receive a selection of goodies!

Check out the videos from the event, 3 students pledge what they will aim to do to reduce their energy use to help their halls win the competition and Tom Yearly, Energy Officer at the University of Reading talks about what else the University is doing in the Degrees Cooler programme.

£24,500

23-month fixed-term contract

Macclesfield

Application deadline: 27 Jul 2009

Interview date: 03 Aug 2009

NUS Services is the commercial arm of the National Union of Students (NUS). NUS and NUS Services work together to run a range of exciting environmental projects greening students, students’ unions and the wider student world. NUS Services has recently received funding to roll out its Green Impact model to 14 new universities over the next two years. Green Impact is a successful environmental accreditation scheme for university departments that tackles common environmental bad practices by enthusing and empowering staff to take practical action. The overall impact of the project will be reductions in energy bills, carbon emissions and waste sent to landfill at each of the universities. We are looking for an enthusiastic project manager to oversee the roll-out of this inspirational project. The successful applicant will be having experience of delivering successful environmental initiatives, and of partnership working.

For a job application pack www.nussl.co.uk/Template.asp?pageID=3890

Greener Living Project Officer

£30,050 per annum pro rata (Inclusive of LW)

Fixed Term Contract – 23 Months

Camden, London

The National Union of Students (NUS) is the national voice of students in the UK, representing the interests of over 7 million learners across the country.

NUS has recently been awarded funding by Defra to deliver a project across 20 universities in England to implement a behaviour change programme in Higher Education. This project aim is to change the behaviour of 90 thousand people.

As our Greener Living Project Officer you will be responsible for the delivery of this project over the next two years. You should be able to demonstrate experience of partnership management, strong project management skills, excellent communications and negotiating skills. You will be a champion of environmental issues and, crucially, you will have the drive to help deliver this project to a high standard ensuring all partners contribution.

For a job application pack please visit www.nus.org.uk/en/About-NUS/Employment.

Deadline: Thursday 30 July 2009 by 5.00pm

Interview to be held on Wednesday 5 August 2009