Developing a Waste Action Plan for the education sector

Now that you’ve completed your waste audit, you’re ready to develop your Waste Action Plan. This will document what you want to achieve, how it will be done, by when, and who is responsible for each part of the plan. It also acts as a reference point to review your progress. Here’s what to include:

• Work out which materials could be recycled and find a service provider to recycle them.

• Identify key materials and consider whether these can be eliminated –for example, by requesting that your suppliers use reusable or recyclable packaging in their supply of products, raw materials, or ingredients.

• Set SMART targets – Specific, Measurable, Agreed, Reasonable and Time-bound. For example, each department to reduce document printing by 25% within the next three months.

• Include ‘quick wins’ to help encourage everybody to get involved and keep up their efforts.

• Communicate the actions you’re taking by using our downloadable communications resources.

• Encourage your staff and students to share their ideas to reduce, reuse and recycle each material.

• Develop a system to review and improve your recycling processes, monitoring progress so that you can see where you’ve made improvements and what more can be done.

• Don’t be afraid to change the plan if necessary – it’s better to have a live document rather than something that just gets filed away.

Good to know

For larger educational settings, a more advanced option is to develop an Environmental Management System (EMS), which works in a similar way to other management systems, such as those that manage quality or safety. It assesses your institution’s strengths and weaknesses, helps you identify and manage significant impacts, saves you money by increasing efficiency, ensures you comply with environmental legislation and provides benchmarks for improvements.