EUROPEAN CITIES CHALLENGE: A STUDENT PERSPECTIVE

"My name is Imogen Snape and I am a Nottingham Trent University Forensic Science student who had the opportunity to travel on the Eurostar to Lille, France and Ghent and Antwerp, Belgium during the start of April earlier this year.

The purpose of the trip was to find out how different countries across the EU engage their young people in sustainability and net-zero initiatives. 

I was travelling on behalf of Bolsover District Council and my role was to find out how my team and I could incorporate our findings and ideas to utilise them back at home to engage our young people in more green projects and increase sustainability education.

We first took a trip to Lille University in France where we got to listen to a variety of individuals who talked us through how they keep their buildings as green as possible such as heating and cooling air from the environment to heat up and cool down inside buildings instead of using a heating system and opening windows which lets out hot air that’s bad for the environment. 

Next, we took a trip to Ghent, Belgium where we met up with a member of the Ghent university’s sustainability group who shared all their ideas for green projects such as replacing small car parks with a green space to encourage cycling and what sustainability “nudges” are.  

Lastly, we attended a sustainability hub in Antwerp, Belgium where we were shown how they up-cycle clothes and items by fixing them and selling them for low prices like a charity shop but they also tailor and fix clothes for a low price to increase the longevity of the clothing and decrease the amount of clothing waste that occurs when simple things such as zippers and buttons are broken.

At the end of the trip my team and I put together a poster which we presented at the end of the trip to Ashfield District Council, Mansfield District Council and of course Bolsover District Council, with the ideas of using sustainability nudges back at home such as bins that have polls such as “who is the better football player” etc so people would be encouraged to put their rubbish in the bin instead of littering, putting together a sustainability school group that carries onto secondary schools and putting on events that encourage greener living such as cycling races. 

Overall, it was a very eye-opening trip where I got to learn a lot and build a better understanding of sustainability and I am so grateful to have had this opportunity and bring some knowledge back home to Bolsover."

Therasa Garrod, Tourism & Place Manager at Bolsover District Council reflected on her participation of the challenge:

“How best to engage young people in decision-making and governance is at the heart of the Bolsover Place Programme.

The learning from this trip has been instrumental in providing a clear way forward to shape a new Young Ambassador Programme. One of the students from the trip who is from the Bolsover area, has agreed to work with me on developing the board and is keen to help shape the new Bolsover Young Ambassador Programme.”

The Nottingham Trent University (NTU) European Cities Challenge is a student-led extracurricular project initiated by NTU Global in 2019. Participants travel to various European cities using sustainable transport to research effective and innovative practices.

These practices are then brought back to their communities with the engagement of local councils. Sustainability and community are at the heart of the challenge, with each iteration focusing on a different theme shaped by council needs.