Student voices for a greener future: a Climate Action Leeds collaboration
As 2024 drew to a close, the Sustainability Service’s Positive Impact Partners programme teamed up with Climate Action Leeds (CAL) to host an insightful discussion with students at the University of Leeds on climate action.
The event brought 11 students together to discuss four of CAL’s seven transition themes: housing, energy, food, and nature. Transition partners from these themes also joined our discussion, ensuring a well-rounded dialogue on issues spanning sustainability, social justice, and student engagement. This collaborative event explored students’ unique perspectives on climate priorities, and what motivates and inhibits students’ involvement in community-led climate initiatives.
In this blog, we share a summary of what students thought were key issues for them related to each of the four climate themes, what motivates them to get involved in community climate action, and what current barriers exist for students’ who want to do more. We end with two key takeaways from the event to encourage more student engagement in community climate action.
For an additional perspective, you can read CAL’s reflections on the event here.
What matters most: students’ climate concerns
First, students participated in a round-table event to discuss their priorities and concerns related to housing, energy, food and nature. CAL transition theme partners represented their areas of work at each table to aid and deepen the discussions with students. Each topic’s discussion highlighted the complexity of achieving sustainability, with students articulating a range of environmental, social, and financial concerns.
On housing and energy
Students’ perspectives on housing and energy revealed a strong interconnectedness between these two areas of climate action for them. While students also discussed energy within the context of public transport, many of their concerns around energy focused on household energy use.
Students emphasized the critical need for sustainable infrastructure in their accommodations, such as better insulation, heat pumps, and solar panels. However, their lived experiences were marked by frustration over the limited agency they have as renters. Challenges like damp conditions, poor insulation, and unaccountable landlords created barriers to making sustainable changes.
This lack of agency was also felt within the context of household energy. Students shared that a lack of choice in energy providers and difficulty understanding whether tariffs truly delivered ‘green’ energy made sustainable energy choices challenging. Existing systems, such as student energy tariffs, also fail to incentivise students toward sustainable energy use, as it can promote wasteful behaviours from students due to the lack of direct accountability. Many found green energy options unaffordable, or for a similar cost to their current provider, which disincentives making more sustainable choices.
Students felt that social challenges compounded these issues as well. The transient nature of student living left some students feeling that their short-term tenancy limited the impact of their actions, as the effort to change energy providers for one-year tenancies felt like an uphill battle. Further, many students felt they had to compromise on the desire for more sustainable behaviour at home against the potential conflict of negotiating behaviour change with housemates.
On food and nature
Students’ discussions on food and nature highlighted overlapping themes of accessibility and inclusivity but revealed distinct differences in how students perceived opportunities for engagement in these areas.
Students highlighted activities such as tackling food waste, promoting plant-based diets and encouraging urban gardening as priorities. However, they felt there were significant financial constraints to sustainable eating, with many finding the cost of plant-based foods and the infrastructure needed for food waste reduction acted as barriers. Additionally, social challenges like differing cooking habits within student households could often hinder collective action on food sustainability. Food-related initiatives for climate action were often described as a more individual endeavour, shaped heavily by personal choices and circumstances.
In comparison, students felt that nature-focused climate initiatives were more approachable, inclusive and community-focused. Where many students talked about food-related climate action within the context of individual or house-based practices, students were most familiar with nature-based climate initiatives at the University and within the city that provided opportunities for collective engagement and community wellbeing. The direct, visible impact of these initiatives, as well as the improvements to mental health, biodiversity and sense of belonging seemed to appeal to students. They highlighted activities like increasing access to greenspace and urban rewilding as priorities, and were likely to have participated in park cleanups or biodiversity related climate action.
Fuelling student action: motivations and barriers to climate engagement
The second half of the event focused on understanding what motivated or prevented students from engaging in community climate action. Those students who were already involved in local initiatives cited a greater sense of agency, social connection, and a desire to contribute to systemic change as driving factors. However, for students who were not currently engaged, several barriers emerged.
Time and capacity were recurring challenges, with many students struggling to balance academic commitments, part-time jobs, and personal lives. Others mentioned feelings of powerlessness or resentment, where systemic issues overshadow individual efforts. For instance, students noted that as tenants, they often lack the influence to push landlords toward sustainable practices, leaving them frustrated and disconnected from potential solutions. This frustration was compounded by a sense of unfairness, as some questioned why they should inconvenience themselves or sacrifice personal comfort for sustainability when others—whether landlords, peers, or larger institutions—fail to make similar efforts.
Students also highlighted a lingering stigma surrounding climate action, with some hesitant to engage due to the stereotypes associated with being a climate activist or "a hippie." This apprehension extended to more direct forms of activism, such as protesting, where concerns about media portrayals, aggression, potential arrest, or disruptions to daily life deterred participation. For many, these risks felt too great, further complicating their willingness to engage in visible or collective climate action.
What’s the takeaway?
Ultimately, the event showcased the wealth of ideas, passion, and potential within the student community and highlighted the need for tailored approaches to student climate engagement. While each topic – housing, energy, food and nature – contributed uniquely to the student experience, the discussions revealed one takeaway that can help engage students in climate action: more community.
Students were particularly drawn to community-driven examples of climate action, whether through rewilding or shared food systems. The social dimension of such initiatives seemed to appeal to students and may have the added benefit of mitigating some of the barriers students shared. Being a part of a wider community working on climate action might help students feel less powerless and isolated in their efforts, as they collectively work toward local goals with others. Further, meeting new and diverse people beyond other students could help reduce concerns around stereotyping and stigma. Getting involved with local community climate action may give students more opportunities to experience the wide variety of ways people show up within community climate action, beyond the role of ‘protestor’.
Community-based nature initiatives, such as biodiversity and rewilding projects, were some of the most well-known initiatives amongst students. While students were less familiar with community-driven initiatives around sustainable housing and energy, they were very interested in the ideas of tenants’ unions for sustainable infrastructure change and community-owned energy schemes. Highlighting the community aspects of climate action initiatives in housing, energy and food could further broaden student engagement in areas they are currently less familiar with.
Want more community?
If you’re a student or member of staff wanting to get involved with community climate action, get in touch by emailing sustainability@leeds.ac.uk to discuss a Positive Impact Partnership or learn more about community climate action in Leeds at climateactionleeds.co.uk.
United Nations Sustainable Development Goals
We use the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a framework to guide our activity. Our work on Positive Impact Partners is linked to the following SDGs:
- Goal 3: Good health and well-being
- Goal 11: Sustainable cities and communities
- Goal 17: Partnerships
Find out more about our impact on the SDGs.
