Can you teach the next generation about climate?

What is the Climate Ambassadors programme?

The Climate Ambassadors Programme is a Department for Education funded initiative to support education settings across England to address climate change. The programme focuses supporting all education settings to have a sustainability lead and climate action plan by the end of 2025, which is a goal in the DfE’s Sustainability and Climate Change Strategy.

UCL are the London Regional Hub for the scheme, and are recruiting, training and supporting Climate Ambassadors (you don't need to be a UCL student!) 

The Ambassadors will in turn help education staff to implement climate action plans in school settings, thereby putting the DfE’s Sustainability and Climate Change Strategy into action.

What does a Climate Ambassadors do?

The main role of a Climate Ambassador is to support education settings to create and implement a climate action plan.

We recognise that often education setting staff have very limited capacity to take on additional workloads, despite their passion and commitment to addressing climate change. To address that, this programme pairs a Climate Ambassador with a specific education setting to provide ongoing support over the course of a school year.

Climate Ambassadors will organise to meet a member of staff in their education setting six times during this time period, following our six-step pathway for developing a climate action plan. Across each of these six sessions, the Climate Ambassador will help the school's staff member to identify potential leverage points, strategies for creating a whole school buy-in, and specific actions that can be taken within the education setting. 

What kind of expertise do Climate Ambassador need?

There is no specific type of expertise or experience that Climate Ambassadors in London need. What we require of every Climate Ambassador is a commitment to supporting education settings to take climate action through the programme over at least one school term.

Each Climate Ambassador receives 1.5 hours of bespoke training from the UCL Climate Action Unit and additional online learning content to gain the skillset and knowledge required to confidently support their education setting. 

How can I become a Climate Ambassadors?

Please follow these steps to become a Climate Ambassador: 

1. Email us at climate_ambassadors@ucl.ac.uk, briefly outlining your interest in the programme, location in London etc.

We’ll then respond to you, with details about: 

2. How to get started supporting an education setting 

3. Signing up to one of our upcoming Climate Ambassador training sessions (three hours total, spread across two sessions) 

4. Signing up to the STEM Learning Platform, so that you can begin your DBS check process.