Bristol University Student Union - Get Green Project Report

Bristol SU Get Green was a two-year project funded by the NUS Students’ Green Fund. The NUS received £5 million of funding from HEFCE which was awarded to twenty-five students’ unions across the country to, “develop ambitious greening projects, leading to step-changes in pro-environmental behaviour across higher education.”

Bristol received approximately £175,000 of funding to create a transformational step change in student attitudes and behaviours towards sustainability and sustainable development. The primary focus of the Students’ Green Fund was to tackle environmental sustainability issues, but SUs also touched upon social and economic issues.

Bristol SU received the funding in September 2013 and recruited a team of two full-time staff and one part-time staff to deliver the targets. Get Green worked in close partnership with the University of Bristol sustainability team throughout the two years to deliver a variety of programmes which increased student awareness of sustainability issues, including: Education for Sustainable Development, energy, recycling and reuse.

Get Green developed a four-step approach to embedding sustainability into the student experience, which allowed the project to maximise its effectiveness and engage over 14,000 across the two years. This approach has been shortlisted for the EAUC Green Gown Award for Student Engagement