Environmental Sustainability Actions

Get Involved

We are ambitious that all IH schools will take positive actions to safeguard our planet, and minimise the negative impacts we have on our environment. As a network, we may each only take small steps at first, but combined together this can have a big impact. If together 5000 members of staff and 200,000 students change just one thing, that is a huge impact. 

Here are some resources and ideas for how you can get involved

Raise Awareness of Sustainability by marking UN Environment Days

We are encouraging all IH schools to mark UN Environment days. There is the World Wildlife Day (3rd March), World Environment Day (3rd June), World Soil Day (5th December) and many more!

For IH schools we are providing links to resources for use with your students and social media graphics. Find them in the secure members area.   

Young Environmentalists Project

The IH Young Environmentalists Project is an international project where student groups work on environmental topics.

We believe that young people are critically aware of the pressures on our planet’s environment and the potential effects on their lives in the years to come. They are best placed to create messages and resources that will resonate with their peers.

In three rounds of the project, running through 2020 and 2021, more than 40 teens from  IH schools in Kazakhstan, Italy, Mexico, Poland, Portugal, Russia, and Spain. created resources for teachers to use in ELT classes, started an instagram account, and produced videos 

These resources are freely downloadable on the ihworld.com << teachers resource library>>

As well as creating valuable project resources, students language skills improved! This is what Pietro from Milan had to say: 

"Don’t even get me started on how much did my English conversation skills improved during the 2 months of the activity, because Yes, even as an almost 18 year old, even as an IH student that is going to do the FIRST CERTIFICATE exam in the span of a year by now and even as an high schooler I actually felt my speaking abilities improving exponentially."

Read the rest of how he felt about the project here

IH 7 Week Environmental Challenge

Inspired by the IH Young Environmentalists Project, starting in April 2021 IH schools joined the IH 7 Week Environmental Sustainability Challenge. 

40,000 km Challenge

During October, November and December 2021, teachers, students and school staff joined together to walk or ride a bike instead of using a car to reduce harmful carbon emissions. 40,000 km is the circumference of the earth, and we wanted the IH community to give our precious planet a metaphorical hug. 

Thanks to the efforts of many people across the world, we smashed our target and walked a total of 56,506km. Well done to all! We hope that we have raised awareness and started some new sustainable habits. 

See our final totaliser here