2026- 27 Secondary School Programme Delivery Guide

Food

• Have a meat-free day(s) every week.
• Hold a completely plant-based ‘save the planet’ week.
• Campaign for less meat and dairy on the school menu.
• Research and suggest alternative tasty plant-based meals for the school menu.
• Survey pupils about what plant-based dishes they like and which meat-based dishes they don’t like so that swaps can be made.
• Reduce food waste at school – weigh how much is wasted each day and run an initiative to raise awareness.
• Investigate ways to reuse leftover food so that it is not thrown away.
• Run a low-carbon packed lunch competition.
• Write to the local council and organise a presentation about having less carbon intensive school menus.
• Grow vegetables at school.
• Create a growing planner for the school year.
• Compost food waste from the kitchen to help food growing.
• Set up a healthy, low carbon tuck shop

Travel

• Organise a walk to school week for all pupils.
• Organise a sustainable transport week for all staff.
• Provide cycling training for pupils.
• Research and request better storage for bikes and scooters.
• Set up car sharing groups.
• Create travel challenges to make walking to school more exciting.
• Organise a bike repair workshop.
• Create a walk, scoot or cycle zone around the school. Ask parents/carers to park outside of this and use active travel for the last 5 minutes into school.
• Raise awareness of the benefits of walking and cycling and the negative impact of air pollution from cars.

Energy

• Use this brilliant year planner created by Energy Sparks to plan activities to reduce energy usage and save money on energy bills throughout the year.
• Monitor temperatures in classrooms and ask the site manager to turn down the heating if it’s too warm.
• Investigate heating settings and timers to make sure heating comes on and goes off at the right time and isn’t on at weekends or in holidays.
• Create a team of pupils to close doors and windows when it’s cold outside.
• Organise a ‘switch off’ day at the end of every half term to make sure unnecessary appliances are not left on during the holidays.
• Encourage teachers to switch off lights and use natural light in their classroom as much as possible.
• Create energy monitors for each class to turn off lights and projectors when they are not in use.
• Create a presentation for teachers about the importance of saving energy in their classrooms.
• Research low energy LED lighting and write to the headteacher to request they are used.
• Research solar panels and create a presentation to persuade the headteacher to get them.
• Create a school challenge to use no electricity for an hour or a whole day.
• Set up an energy monitoring team to record electricity and gas consumption every week and set targets for the school.
• Encourage the school business manager to switch to a renewable electricity provider.

Purchasing

• Encourage all classes to reduce and reuse paper as much as possible.
• Monitor the amount of printing used every month and campaign for teachers to print less. This is possible if you have a printer that tells you how many sheets have been printed each month.
• Set printing to double-sided and black and white as default on all computers
• Conduct a single-use plastic audit. Then identify ways to reduce the schools plastic use.
• Ensure all pupils have a reusable water bottle instead of buying single use ones.
• Set up a ‘free stuff’ area in school for items that are no longer wanted so that they can be re-used.
• Organise a swap event. This could be a ‘uniform swap’ or ‘toy and book’ swap.
• Encourage teachers to use natural materials for art and design instead of any made from non-recyclable plastic.
• Research low carbon stationery products, for example refillable glue sticks. Make a presentation and suggest them to the business manager.
• Set up a recycling team to check what can be recycled in your area and raise awareness about what should be going in the recycling bins.
• Ensure every classroom is recycling all its recyclable waste.
• Create a reusable events kit for school/class parties.
• Identify if there are ways to reduce disposable equipment in classrooms or at lunchtimes. Choose one and do it.