Sample letter to the VC

Dear VC,

We are writing to you on behalf of the X University People & Planet group regarding the University and its environmental performance. Today, Britain’s universities have a huge environmental impact that could be massively reduced. Several UK universities have already shown that high environmental performance is possible - cutting greenhouse gas emissions through reducing energy use; reducing water use; increasing recycling rates and reducing landfilled waste; purchasing environmentally friendly products and services; eliminating unnecessary consumption; promoting environmentally friendly travel options to university sites; and improving local biodiversity.

*ADD YOUR LOCAL INFO HERE

Include info from the information gathering you did to find out how green your university is. Applaud good progress, and highlight inaction. Say something like: While we know that you have got ‘a’ and ‘b’ in place, we believe that the university needs to adopt the following four factors if it is to legitimately claim that it is committed to environmental responsibility.*

The enclosed report ‘Going Green’ sets out the key steps that all universities including X, need to take to achieve high environmental performance. It includes case studies of good practice, and we believe that our University should follow their lead. These four factors are common to almost all the institutions that are leading environmental performance within the UK Higher Education sector.

Specifically we believe that our University should: 1. Employ full-time staff dedicated to environmental management - developing objectives, setting priorities and significant, time-bound targets to fulfil them. 2. Conduct a comprehensive review of all the University’s environmental impacts - so that current impacts are measured, potential improvements identified, and performance monitored. 3. Produce a publicly available environmental policy - to provide a formal demonstration of intent regarding environmental performance improvement, and against which to compare practice. 4. Finally we believe that your support for high environmental standards is particularly important. Experience shows that no programme to green the University will work without the active, public support of senior management.

We look forward to hearing from you,

On behalf of X People & Planet