SORTED Guide to Sustainability in Further Education

Introduction to the Guide

The aim of this guide is to provide colleges and other Further Education (FE) institutions with specific guidance on embedding sustainability into every aspect of your organisation, with inspiring examples of what others are already doing.

The Guide will provide a starting point, inspiration and signposts to places of more information if you wish to delve deeper. It can also be used by those already on the sustainability journey, as a way of reviewing where you are going, and where you may look next.

This guide is supported by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Global Universities Partnership on Environment and Sustainability (GUPES).

The Guide is structured around the categories outlined in the Sustainability Leadership Scorecard. Each section is designed to be a starting point, a quick read to introduce you to the area, covering:

• Introduction to the topic area
• Organisational value of embedding sustainability in this area
• Wider benefits of embedding sustainability in this area
• Getting started
• Useful resources (links to resource, brief description of resource & use)
• Great examples (case studies – provided by EAUC).

Before reading each section, take a moment to pause and reflect on the following questions. Capture your ideas on paper before you start reading the section.

• What are we already doing in this area?
• If there were no limits, no “if’s” and “but’s”, what would I like to see happening in my organisation relating to this area in 5 years?

Then as you read through the Guide, think about how to make your ideas a reality.  What would it take? Who else has done something similar or gone some way towards it already?