Green Gown 2019 Winners Leading the Way to a Low Carbon Future

Green Gown 2019 Winners Leading the Way to a Low-Carbon Future

Salix are proud to sponsor the Green Gown Awards again this year, putting a spotlight on the innovative and inspiring sustainability work taking place in universities and colleges across the UK to create a brighter future for their students.

This year’s UK and Ireland Green Gown Awards finalists represented over one million students and 162,000 staff. They are leading the way with their commitment to the global sustainability agenda and demonstrating the value that universities and colleges bring to the wellbeing of society. Organised by the EAUC - the Alliance for Sustainability Leadership in Education, the awards ceremony was held at Glasgow Science Centre on Tuesday 26th November 2019.

Solutions offered to some of the growing sustainability issues included Deposit Return Schemes, zero waste shops and 100% renewable energy powered campuses. Research from finalists covered ground-breaking air quality studies, ways to improve the sustainable production and consumption of cut flowers, tools to help calculate carbon sequestration in trees and engineering ideas to overcome water shortages.

Iain Patton, CEO at EAUC and co-host of the Green Gown Awards ceremony, said: “Now in its 15th year, the Green Gown Awards celebrate the very pinnacle of best practice in a sector that is well ahead of the curve on the sustainability agenda. The submissions this year were of an incredibly high calibre, tackling a huge array of sustainable development areas. It was a hard process to pick the winners, and it involved over 90 national and international judges”.

Salix proudly sponsored the Sustainability Champion Award and would like to congratulate all of those that entered for their amazing work on leading the way to a low carbon future.

Sustainability Champion Award – Staff
Zulfi Ali – Canterbury Christ Church University (CCCU), Highly Commended - Dr Karen Thompson

Judges were blown away by the dynamism, range and scale of Zulfi’s approach to enriching the academic experience, encouraging social activism inspiring across the university a community of critical thinkers.

Zulfi reflected on his work, noting “The significance of my work lies in the fact that CCCU is a widening participation University in the South East of England and for various reasons, until three years ago there was little precedence of strong student engagement in the life of the university outside formal learning activities.  

Three years on, evidence suggests that CCCU is a different place today. Awareness of environmental and social justice issues is much higher, and sustainability related issues are starting to get embedded in the culture of the university”. 

Sustainability Champion Award – Student
Tom Bedford – Keele University

Judges commented that Tom is a natural and strong volunteer student leader who is confident, engaging, self-motivated and inspiring. The judges could see that Tom has developed a great skill set particularly in speaking and organising students across the university and wider community.

Tom highlights the importance of leading by example, explaining that “Since starting at Keele, I have been on a journey to promote sustainability.

My involvement and impact with climate action has accelerated over the past year, enabling me to meet inspiring people through involvement in UK and international conferences such as attending the 24th UN Climate Change Conference, leading in local Schools Climate Strikes, co-hosting an episode of the BBC’s ‘Costing The Earth’ and being a panellist on ‘The Big Questions’.  

Through collaboration with fellow members of the UK Youth Climate Coalition to hose the UK’s first Local Conference of Youth, these activities enabled me to set an example to inspire and empower others to join the climate movement and drive climate action”.

The Winners’ Brochure can be found here.

For more information about how Salix can fund your university or college’s energy efficiency project please visit our college and universities loan pages.

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