GATE // School Managers Quiz
área i: Embodying Sustainability Values // feedback and tips
Feedback and Tips
Basic Level
Description
You are beginning to recognise the importance of embedding sustainability values into school culture and decision-making. At this stage, actions may appear in isolated projects or policies, such as occasional eco-friendly purchases or single events promoting fairness or nature. Planning and leadership still mostly follow traditional approaches, with limited integration of sustainability principles. Initial steps may include raising awareness among staff and students and exploring how values can guide school operations.
Advanced Level
Description
You actively work to integrate sustainability values into school-wide practices. Fairness, equity, and care for nature are reflected in policies, procurement, and planning processes. You encourage staff and students to participate in discussions about shared values and ensure these principles influence decisions. Sustainability values are visible in multiple areas of school life, from curriculum to facilities management. You show commitment to creating a culture where ethical reasoning and respect for nature guide everyday actions.
Expert Level
Description
You lead your school in embedding sustainability values deeply into its vision, policies, and culture. Decision-making consistently reflects fairness, equity, and ecological responsibility. Collaborative processes ensure that students, staff, and community partners co-create value-based strategies. Sustainability principles shape all aspects of school life, from resource use to partnerships. Your leadership models transparency, inclusion, and care for nature, making the school a recognised example of value-driven sustainability.
Tips to raise your level
level basic TIPS
To strengthen this Area, you might consider:
Make sustainability part of the school’s identity.
Schools such as Escola Secundária de Estarreja (Portugal) and Wrocław International School (Poland) embed sustainability, fairness and care for nature into mission statements and everyday language, legitimising action across the school. This helps the school community understand that sustainability has to be tackled within a whole-school approach.
Try this:
- Add sustainability values to your school’s vision or mission in consultation with staff, students, and families.
- Include sustainability criteria in your school improvement plan or quality frameworks.
- Display sustainability principles in shared spaces, newsletters, and digital platforms to keep them visible and active.
Enable early student leadership.
Student councils, eco-teams or action groups are supported from the outset, as seen in Junior High School of Gera (Greece), where students initiate awareness campaigns linked to real community issues. Support student initiatives in order to promote student active engagement in real life situations. Emotional involvement fosters meaningful learning.
Try this:
- Create or support an “eco-rep” or sustainability ambassador system across all grades.
- Allocate a small, flexible budget or regular meeting time for student-led sustainability actions.
- Encourage students to conduct a simple eco-audit of school practices and present their recommendations to the leadership team.
Model sustainability through leadership behaviour.
School leaders reinforce values by supporting visible practices (plastic reduction, water saving, green spaces), demonstrating that sustainability is lived, not symbolic. School leaders should not only support but be actively engaged and participate in practical initiatives promoted by teachers and students, fostering empathy among the school community.
Try this:
- Join a student-led sustainability activity, like a clean-up or planting event, and share the experience during a staff meeting.
- Reduce plastic or energy use in staff offices or common areas and celebrate staff-led improvements.
- Participate in an inter-school or municipal sustainability roundtable as a school representative, showing public commitment.
Advanced basic TIPS
To strengthen this Area, you might consider:
Institutionalise sustainability governance
At Escola Secundária D. Manuel Martins (Portugal) and British School of Brussels (Belgium), sustainability is supported through formal structures, long-term programmes and recurring evaluation. You can promote the creation of a long-term plan, implement pilot projects, evaluate and refine them.
Try this:
- Form a Sustainability Steering Committee with representation from students, teachers, admin staff, and parents.
- Develop a 3-year sustainability plan with goals for infrastructure, teaching, and community partnerships.
- Use regular school evaluations (e.g. quality assurance reviews) to track progress on sustainability indicators.
Enable interdisciplinary and systemic learning.
Schools like International High School of Wrocław (Poland) and IES Ana Carmona “Veleta” (Spain) encourage cross-subject collaboration, helping students understand environmental, social and economic systems together. Promote interdisciplinary student-centered projects (within the topic) at national and international level (by means of European platforms like eTwinning) leading students to collaborate and learn in a meaningful and long lasting way.
Try this:
- Encourage teams of teachers to co-design project-based learning weeks with sustainability themes.
- Support eTwinning or Erasmus+ partnerships focused on sustainability challenges.
- Make time in the schedule for collaborative planning across departments.
Connect sustainability to inclusion and wellbeing.
In Evening Junior High School of Mytilene (Greece), sustainability is explicitly linked to social justice, inclusion and human rights, ensuring relevance for diverse learners. Encourage emotional literacy among the school community in order to promote well-being within school projects related to sustainability. Projects should be student-centered and target students’ individual needs so as to promote inclusion.
Try this:
- Run a wellbeing audit of school sustainability projects; do they meet students’ emotional and social needs?
- Embed student voice practices (surveys, focus groups) into planning sustainability projects.
- Train staff in emotional literacy and trauma-informed approaches so they can support inclusion through sustainability initiatives.
Expert basic TIPS
To strengthen this Area, you might consider:
Connect schools with municipalities and institutions.
At Liceum Ogólnokształcące nr V we Wrocławiu (Poland), participation in Wrocławska Akademia Klimatu links students directly with city-level climate action. The whole-school approach is aimed at involving not only the school community but also the wider community, guaranteeing a wider impact.
Try this:
- Form a partnership agreement with a local municipality or environmental agency to co-develop a sustainability campaign or pilot project.
- Include local stakeholders in school planning meetings or sustainability councils.
- Invite city representatives to participate in student-led summits or exhibitions.
Support student political and civic agency.
Schools like Carl-Severing-Berufskolleg (Germany) and Ruusuvuori School (Finland) legitimise student engagement with policy, labour markets and community sustainability challenges. Students’ engagement fosters the development competences like critical thinking and problem-solving, preparing them for real-life situations of the future.
Try this:
- Establish a Student Sustainability Council with the mandate to propose initiatives and speak at school board meetings.
- Encourage participation in Model UN, SDG-related debates, or local policy consultations.
- Partner with NGOs or youth organisations to offer civic engagement workshops.
Embed sustainability into long-term strategy.
Expert schools integrate sustainability goals into development plans, facilities management and partnerships, ensuring durability beyond individual projects. Sustainability projects planning should go beyond school premises and project lifetime, ensuring long-term sustainability and impact.
Try this:
- Include sustainability targets and indicators in your school’s strategic development plan.
- Allocate part of the annual budget specifically for sustainability innovations and staff training.
- Use a whole-school self-review framework (e.g., Eco-Schools) to assess and guide progress annually.