The Leicester Award Update

Following on from my previous post about the Leicester Award, here is an update on what I am doing for my Award in Environmental Volunteering.

During our workshop, we arranged ourselves into groups. My group and I decided on a key issue that we want to change at university – the way students travel. Many students from Oadby Student Village buy the bus pass, a few drive and a few walk or cycle. Whilst the bus pass is a more sustainable option than driving, we felt that a higher proportion of students should be walking/cycling to uni, as the benefits outweigh any disadvantages. Walking and cycling are zero-carbon methods of travel, there is no dependence on buses, you can choose when to leave home, get daily exercise, stop off at a number of shops, take the scenic walk through Victoria Park and generally not have to deal with buses!

We knew that it would be difficult to get students to make the switch to walking/cycling, since many have already bought the bus pass, however we wanted to try a reward scheme for those that do already walk and cycle, to spread the word that the bus pass isnt necessarily the only option and promote an alternative lifestyle.  To do this we intend to reward those that walk home from campus by offering the free vouchers once they collect all the stamps along the route home.

Over the past few weeks I have been planning and organising my project with my group which has been a learning curve and great exercise in teamwork. We have divied up the tasks of communicating to potential sponsors, recruiting helpers, calculating equipment needs etc. The event will go live on the 10th of February, so keep an eye out for us near the entrance to Victoria Park, by Charles Wilson and Attenborough! For every hour we spend on our project, we are one hour closer to meeting the 20 hours of volunteering that are required for the Leicester Award. Other groups are also operating on different days of Go Green Week (9th – 13th) which I intend to help out at to further achieve my 20 hours of volunteering.

Caroline