Stirling Students Union has been awarded the Excellent Award after a Green Impact Students Union audit conducted by Students Organising (SOS) for Sustainability UK.
The Green Impact Award is a programme recognised by the United Nations and is designed to encourage and support environmentally and socially sustainable practices within organisations.
Environmental Sustainability
A key element of the Green Impact Award is the Union’s dedication to making environmentally sustainable choices.
In 2023-2024, Stirling Students Union ran and facilitated many sustainability-centric events on campus. These included Eco Living Workshops, Climate Cafes, and weekly community garden sessions.
The union also secured funding from Stirling Council to revive the Community Food Initiative, securing partnerships that allow surplus food to be distributed through the Community Fridge and Pantry on campus.
The Green & Blue Space on campus remains successful, having collected three metric tonnes of items to reduce, reuse, and recycle, saving many items from going directly to landfills. The Green & Blue Space also offers a range of non-plastic items for sale and plans to offer seasonal produce in Vegbags.
Social Sustainability
In addition to environmental sustainability, the Green Impact Award also takes into account the Union’s social sustainability – its ability to create nurturing spaces that sustainably promote wellbeing and social inclusion.
The Union has introduced sustainability training to the Academic Representative programme, ensuring these students can champion sustainability throughout all of the university’s modules.
New policies have been introduced to the Union itself, governing how it operates in the long term, ensuring future staff have a good baseline of sustainable practice to build off. These include the Student’s Union Domestic Flight Policy and the Fossil Free Careers Policy.
The Union has also worked with the Global Justice Stirling (GJS) Society to create an Ethical Careers Policy. The union and GJS are working directly with the university on their Socially Responsible Investment Policy.
“This pushes us to do more.”
Justine Pédussel, VP Communities, said “The SU is incredibly pleased to retain our rating of Excellent on the Green Impact Award. It’s reflective of the commitment that our student-staff and volunteers make to the SU’s work on sustainability, and how important we take our responsibility.”
She mentions that SOS tighten up their requirements for the Excellent Award every year, ensuring that participating unions continue to push forward in their sustainability efforts.
“In the last year we’ve been able to secure commitments from the University on everything from re-useable cups and ethical careers policies, but there’s always more! We’re going to be working on waste and recycling on campus as well as sustainability in the curriculum for example this year.
“I’d like to thank Zoe, my predecessor as VP Communities, as well as all the other officers, volunteers and staff who contributed to this achievement. Particular congratulations should go to our outstanding societies who have campaigned hard and continue to do so”.
Stirling University currently ranks in the top 15% of universities globally for sustainability and is 35th out of 93 in the UK.
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