Max Franz Sikora joined the Department for Social Responsibility and Sustainability on a placement from the Technical University of Munich for 2 months. In this blog, he reflects on what he learnt.

For the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women we hear from student Debbie Shamir, about the Girl Up Edinburgh society, which works to promote gender equality.

Sustain.ED is the The Students’ Association’s annual festival about sustainability. We hear from Vice President Community, Rosheen Wallace, about this year’s event.

Second-year Veterinary student, Niamh Kinch, tells us about why she’s helping conserve the local hedgehog population through the Hedgehog Friendly Campus initiative. 

Dave Gorman, Director of the Department for Social Responsibility and Sustainability, has now been vegan for 6 months. On World Vegan Day, we learn why he made the change and how he’s found the switch.

In September 2019, the University appointed Sandy Tudhope – a Professor of Climate Studies – as its Lead on Climate Responsibility and Sustainability. We caught up with Sandy to ask him what this new role involves and to tell us more about the University’s response to the climate crisis.

We’re highlighting the impacts of the climate crisis by sharing the first-hand experiences of staff, students and alumni, focusing on those in the global south.  Our next contribution is from Aayush Goyal, a University of Edinburgh alumnus and co-founder of social enterprise, Social Stories Club. 

Fourth-year English Literature student, Saffron Roberts, started holding sanitary product collections in March 2018 to tackle period poverty and stigma around menstruation. Since, she’s been joined by student Rosie Martland in the effort to collect donations for local foodbanks, women’s and homeless shelters.

Kerry Cheek, SRS Projects Coordinator, has a background working in both laboratory research and in sustainability. Here, she reflects on a recent project in which she researched laboratory plastic waste at the University of Edinburgh.

This week is Women’s Environmental Network‘s Environmenstrual Week of Action. We hear from students Kate Bennett and Martha Aroha Reilly on the work of the student-founded non-profit organisation, Sanitree to tackle period poverty.