At Green Schools Revolution, we're supporting students across the country to make their schools more sustainable. As a pilot project, we’ve been changing our provision to suit each school, and The Polygon School is no exception.
The Polygon School is a SEND school in Southampton, who firmly believe that “students of the school should be valued and treated fairly regardless of their background or ability. At the Polygon School we aim to remove any barriers to learning and give our students a positive educational experience that can then lead them onto success in the future.”
The Polygon School are taking part in both the Climate Action Plan (CAP) and Wilding Schools programmes, generating an even more well-rounded approach to sustainability by improving school biodiversity and making structural changes to reduce their carbon emissions.
Talia, Climate Action Plans Coordinator, explains how Polygon’s project has been created from the students and by the students from the beginning:
“When a session was less successful, it was back to the drawing board, assuring the school that our priority for the project was respecting the abilities and talents of the students and the frameworks that the school had in place to support them.”
So far, the students have completed the 4 climate workshops with great enthusiasm and engagement. For example, the Green Careers session was tailored to career pathways that the students would be more interested in and likely to have access to, creating visions of a greener future and uplifting their career ambitions!
The CAP team are about to deliver our final session about what specific actions can be included in their Climate Action Plan. This is to ensure they feel ownership over the final CAP plan and that they recognise changes that take place in school as theirs. The students will lead in what they want to see happen, and SOS-UK will be there to guide rather than dictate their project.
Talia explains, “I really enjoyed working with The Polygon School students to develop their CAP. We were constantly adapting our approach and delivery to best engage with the students, ensuring that content was led by their interests. Most excitingly, after just a few sessions it became clear that many students at The Polygon have a talent for the visual arts. We were subsequently able to embrace this and centred our sessions’ activities around drawing and creation. This allowed the students to showcase themselves and their abilities, taking ownership over their CAP.”
This event and the work of Green Schools Revolution would not be possible without the generosity of the #iwill Fund, a joint investment from The National Lottery Community Fund and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) which supports young people to access high quality social action opportunities.
