This year’s progress for the Environmental and Sustainability Working Group

Since sharing our Action Plan on the Environment and Sustainability in January 2023, we are pleased to report that significant progress has been made on a number of our actions.  

We have updated our action plan webpage with RAG statuses (red = not yet started/action required, amber = more work to do, green = project on track) to show our progress for each action.  

Here are some of our highlights from 2023:  

• Sustainability is a core aspect of the Association Strategy for 2023-2027. It is now included in our strategic aims and values.  

• We gained valuable student feedback on sustainability in our Annual Membership Survey.  

• We created an Environment and Sustainability web hub, including an ideas bank and resource hub, to share our work. 

• We held a successful sustainability panel event as part of Freshers Fortnight Sept-Oct 2023, hosted by the Working Group’s co-chair Lou Robinson (Vice President Engagement) with four OU academics. Over 50 students attended. 

• We achieved a fantastic result in the Student Union and Student Representation categories in the People & Planet University League.  

• Our Travel and Subsistence Policy for staff and volunteers has been updated with environmental sustainability considerations. 

• We have continued to build our partnership with the Open University on sustainability. Our collaborative work on Responsible Futures accreditation is ongoing and we look forward to the results of the student-led audit in spring 2024.  

We are looking forward to continuing our progress in 2024.  

If you’re keen to be involved in this work, the Environment and Sustainability Society are looking for committee members. Email oustudents-societies@open.ac.uk to express your interest.