One World. One Future. One Chance.
One GDST – our commitment to sustainability – brings together student-led campaigns and ambitious targets at every level across the GDST under the ethos ‘One World, One Future, One Chance. This work provides a greener curriculum where students tackle real-world problems and a greener estate, with inspiring and sustainable spaces.
Our work includes a strategy to deliver Net Zero by 2050, and we have already achieved CarbonNeutral® Organisation certification.
New buildings added to our estate are designed to Net Zero carbon targets with best practice standards at their heart. Our wider Decarbonisation strategy involves reducing energy usage across our existing Estate, which involves a number of projects and initiatives.
We procure renewable electricity and replace inefficient lights with LED fittings across our schools. A number of our schools already have solar panels and we are piloting estate-wide solar panel installations, as well as investigating options around the more extensive decarbonisation of our heating systems.
We know the only way to tackle climate change is through collective action and partnerships are key to this. Upskilling our teachers is an important strand of this work and over 100 staff have now completed the eduCCate Global Bronze Award. We have also contributed to nationally significant research on sustainability education in partnership with UCL’s Centre for Climate Change and Sustainability Education.
As we plan the next steps of our sustainability journey, we are aware that climate change impacts women most acutely – with the UN finding that 80% of people displaced by climate change are women – and that some of those women live in the poorest parts of the planet.
As the largest educator of girls in the UK, the GDST has an important role to play in championing a greener future. Together, we have a unique opportunity to create our own legacy, one that will mean future generations of GDST girls will look back and feel proud of our contribution to tackling the unprecedented planetary challenges we currently face.
Our One sustainability strategy was founded on the idea that as a family of schools we are stronger together and can act as a united community to create a more sustainable world.
In June 2023, Year 6 students across the GDST came together at Wimbledon High School to engage with nature through a range of outdoor learning activities including orienteering, creating art and sculptures with leaves and twigs, and writing and reciting poetry inspired by their surroundings and our We Are One sustainability curriculum. At the event, we asked our students to share their thoughts and hopes for a greener future.
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