Welcome to The Network News

Welcome to the latest edition of Network News. This edition focuses on the tertiary sector and looks at how colleges and universities are managing their waste, how students are getting involved, and what resources are available.

Scotland was ‘Rubbish at Recycling’ until the Scottish Executive allocated serious funding to councils for domestic kerbside collections, promotion of composting etc; and now around a quarter of household waste is diverted from landfill. 

Scotland’s 60+ Universities and Colleges risk being left behind unless we take a pro-active approach to waste minimisation.  True partnerships are needed to push beyond compliance so that colleges and universities can take a leadership role within their communities.  The Network team have brought together plenty of useful pointers in this month’s Network News – starting, rightly, with students on how they want better facilities in Focus on, and in Top Ten Tips students can find out ways to reduce, reuse and recycle and even prevent waste during their every day activities.

Continuing the theme of tertiary education, the Education, Training and Resources section gives details of “A Practical Waste Management Guide for Universities and Colleges”, which includes tips and pro-forma examples you can simply lift and adapt for your own use.  The Environmental Association for Universities and Colleges’ Campus Sustainability Programme (CaSPr) is also to play a growing role as a one-stop waste shop for colleges and universities – two CaSPr workshops in October focussed on waste minimisation and dealing with Special Waste.  A list of forthcoming seminars and workshops can also be found in this section.

This edition’s features include ‘More Best Practice from Abroad’ photos, and gives you the chance to ‘Be heard!’ in the readers survey. You can also find other regular features, updates and event information, including sign-up information for the National Network Event, being held on 21 November.

Read on, take action, and pass this on to interested colleagues!

David Somervell
Energy & Sustainability Manager, University of Edinburgh
Branch Secretary, EAUC-Scotland