Bradford College

Take Action and Make the Change

As a member of the Prince’s May Day Network, the College recently pledged to take action against carbon emissions and climate change - encouraging staff, learners and visitors to do the same.

In a bid to publicise this further, a competition was held by Building Services Assistant Manager, Ian Brown to produce a series of signs demonstrating the College’s commitment to recycling.

The College takes its commitment to environmentally friendly issues very seriously and has pledged to take action in the following areas:

• To continue the current recycling of wood, paper, cardboard, metal, plastic and food waste.
• To extend these recycling schemes for local businesses.
• To use bio-diesel to run its fleet of vans.
• To run courses in waste management for the local community
• To turn waste food into compost and grow vegetables for College use.
• To support worldwide and international action to cut its carbon footprint and reduce omissions.
  

To mark the achievements of these award winning designs, students were invited to attend a formal presentation ceremony, where the winners of the competition were revealed.  Executive Director of Finance, Mr Doug Stott was on hand to present the award winners with a voucher and congratulate them on their innovative designs.

The winning entries were designed by students on the National Diploma in Art and Design Photography course:  Sam Finister, Kelsey Ambler, Matthew Wilkinson, Sophie Mitchell and Lisa Milner.  Students, Amanda Smith and Joe Sutherland from the National Diploma Art and Design Graphics course also scooped prizes in the innovative competition.

Speaking at the event, Executive Director of Finance, Doug smiled and said:  “I’m not renowned for giving away money, but at an event like this, it’s a pleasure to give money to our students, in the form of a voucher.  I think it’s been well earned, which is evident from the quality of work on display here today!”

Proud Tutor, Suzanne Griffiths said: “I’ve been teaching on the National Diploma for about 9 years and I love working with all the students!”

When asked how she became involved in the project, Suzanne replied: “Ian Brown and Mark Hirst approached me to ask if the students would like to get involved.  I agreed and gave every student the brief as a summer project. They worked through the summer and came up with these fabulous designs.  When they returned after the holidays they started to build the posters and banners… that’s how it came about.”  Pointing to the work on display at the presentation ceremony, Suzanne said: “They’ve produced excellent work like this - “I’m really proud of them.”

Sam Finister produced one of the winning entries and remarked: “Looking at the high standard of work produced by other people on the course, I feel proud to have been selected.  It’s good to see my work up and around Bradford College. ”

Student Matthew Wilkinson added: “It’s good to see my poster up, inspiring people to recycle. The greener Bradford College is the better.”

The Prince's May Day Network was founded in 2007 by Prince Charles and is run by BITC (Business in the Community). It is the UK’s largest group of businesses committed to taking action on climate change. To date over 1,100 businesses of all sizes and from all sectors have signed up, collectively promising to play a powerful role reducing the UK's carbon emissions. You can find out more at www.bitc.org.uk    

• Click here to view award winners’ gallery presentation.  Photographs courtesy of Joseph Dawson, HND Photography Student.