Initiatives Students Become Carbon Literate 15.03.2023

This year, students at Collyer’s have been given the opportunity to complete the Carbon Literacy course, a collaborative project involving all FE Sussex colleges. The course aims to inform students about how carbon emissions cause climate change and importantly how they can help to combat global warming. The course was piloted at Collyer’s by Travel and Tourism students, before being offered to all students. The course includes high quality resources developed by Manchester Metropolitan University, delivered in a series of narrated and annotated PowerPoint files. Students took between five to ten hours to complete a workbook that walked them through the material. The final part of the course was to submit two pledges, an individual pledge and a group pledge, and the students attended a Webinar to discuss their pledges before they were submitted to the Carbon Literacy Project.

Over 110 students signed up for the FESussex Carbon Literacy Project in 2022 and over 70 successfully completed the course. This year the course is being offered as an enrichment option as well as being integrated into Yr 13 Geography and Yr 12 Environmental Science classes. It is planned that further conservation and recycling opportunities will be offered during enrichment next year.

As part of the Carbon Literacy Project, Environmental Science students were invited to a masterclass on the Circular Economy, the idea that all objects should be designed to be reused once its initial use is over. The class was delivered by Elle Runton who has corporate experience working for multinational companies, including Coca Cola European Partners, and Emirates Nature – WWF in the UAE. Students really enjoyed benefitting from Elle’s fantastic experience and expertise. The masterclasses explored useful examples and created resources that the group will be able to use in their final exams.