Carbon-cutting school awards launched

Schools taking initiatives to save energy and reduce their carbon footprint have until May to enter the Ashden School Awards

Posted by Dave Higgitt | April 04, 2015 | Sustainability

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• #sustainable-energy
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• #less-co2

Sustainable energy charity Ashden has launched its 2015 Ashden School Awards. The awards will recognise schools’ commitments to saving energy and cutting carbon and will be presented at a ceremony in the autumn. On 21 October, up to four awards will be presented at the LSO St Luke’s building in London, with each school receiving a share of a £10,000 prize fund.

Ashden rewards and supports schools, businesses and other organisations that are demonstrating achievements in cutting carbon and saving energy in the UK and across the globe.

As well as a financial award, Ashden also provides winning schools with a package of support tailored to their needs. This includes advice on how they can make more savings, introductions to previous Ashden Award-winning schools, media materials and support with communication. Winners can also join Ashden’s ‘Less CO2’ programme, a year-long peer-to-peer learning programme to help schools reduce their fuel bills and cut carbon emissions.

Okehampton College in Devon won an Ashden Award in 2010 and has since become a mentor school in the ‘Less CO2’ programme, as well as winning the Zayed Future Energy Prize in 2013. Keith Webber, community technology coordinator at Okehampton, said: “Winning an Ashden Award gave real credibility to the work we have been doing, as well as the encouragement to develop it further. It also led to new opportunities and partnership working that our school has greatly benefited from.”

Last year’s Ashden School Award winners were Sir George Monoux Sixth-Form College in Walthamstow, London, and St Faith’s Prep School in Cambridge. Applying for an Ashden Award is free and the deadline for entries is 5 May 2015. More information about the awards and the application criteria can be found on the charity’s website.

www.ashden.org