A community of educators empowering students to take climate action
What does membership of the LSEN involve?
Membership means that you and your students
- Receive joining information, agendas and minutes of our student-led LSEN meetings and webinars
- Have the opportunity for your students to chair and minute meetings
- Have access to our Teams site
- students can collaborate on projects and receive information about opportunities such as podcast recordings, events and competitions
- staff can discuss topics in the Staff Only channel
- Receive invites to our face-to-face events, which include workshops, summer camps and Mock COPs
- Receive the UKSSN newsletter
There is no membership fee. Occasionally there will be optional events run by or with the LSEN that have a cost, but this is kept to an absolute minimum.
What types of schools can join?
There is no barrier to entry - we welcome all types of secondary schools in the Greater London area! We especially encourage state schools to join. Independent schools are welcome to join and in doing so we ask them to work with their partnership schools on LSEN projects. At present we do not work with Primary Schools, but we encourage all our LSEN schools to work with Primaries in their local area. Please get in touch if you have any questions or if you would like further support.
What’s expected of me as a staff member?
As a teacher with a full timetable, I completely understand that fitting the LSEN into an already busy role can be a challenge! As a minimum we require you to be a port of call for students from your school, as per our safeguarding policy. This means that students can reach out to their staff member if something concerns them on Teams or during a call. However, many staff members are much more involved and attend meetings and events, join discussions on Teams and are in our friendly staff-only WhatsApp group.
What happens in between meetings?
Although only a few students from each school are represented in the LSEN we know they are really keen that the benefits of membership are felt by their whole school community. Often, LSEN reps report back to their school Environment Committees during their meetings to ensure many more students hear about our work. Our campaigns are designed with schools in mind - we've previously recorded assemblies, planned form times, made quizzes and written letters to be shared with students, staff and parents. Meeting minutes are shared with members and often students have follow up tasks to complete before the next meeting.
Do members of staff attend the online meetings and face to face events?
Absolutely. We encourage all staff to attend as our online meetings, webinars and events as they are always an inspiring and informative experience for everyone! Joining also allows staff to meet one another and share ideas about campaigns in their schools. However, we appreciate that joining is not always possible. As we have direct parental consent for LSEN involvement it is up to your school’s own safeguarding policy whether you should be present. We always have a number of experienced, practising fully DBS-checked and safeguarding-trained school staff on Zoom calls and we ensure there’s always one member of staff per breakout room, but staff need to check with their DSL as different schools have different policies.
Why do students need to fill out a consent form?
As per our safeguarding policy, students who have been selected by their schools as LSEN reps must return a completed parental consent form to receive emails, be invited to online meetings and have access to our Microsoft Teams collaboration space.
How many students from my school can get involved?
Many schools have the role of LSEN student rep as a position in their Environment Committee, but it is up to each school how they choose their LSEN reps. We suggest that LSEN schools have a minimum of two LSEN reps from Years 8 -13 (and we appreciate that Year 11 and 13 students may have less availability!). Students who apply to be LSEN reps should ensure their Thursday evenings are generally free for meetings. Some schools may choose to have three or four reps in total and have a rotation schedule to ensure someone is able to attend each meeting.
Can other members of staff get involved?
Absolutely! Several of our schools have two or three staff members involved and share meeting attendance. We often host events that are relevant for key school staff (e.g. catering managers). Additionally, UKSSN runs a group for Chief Operating Officer/Bursar/Estate Manager/Senior Budget holders/equivalent to discuss carbon audits, energy suppliers, catering, biodiversity and grounds management, travel and waste. Please contact [email protected] for more information.
Can my students be on Teams if I’m not a member?
Unfortunately no. This is for safeguarding reasons. We need staff to log on to Teams in case their students have any concerns, as you are their point of contact. If staff can’t use Teams this will limit their student’s involvement in the LSEN. There are many experienced, practising, fully DBS-checked and safeguarding-trained school staff already on our Teams site so everything is well supervised and as we have direct parental consents for LSEN involvement it is up to your school’s own safeguarding policy how much you monitor Teams. Please speak to us and your DSL if you have any further questions.
Why do you use both Zoom and Teams?
We use Zoom for online meetings as it’s a familiar format. With time we may migrate to Teams calls once more staff and students are familiar with the system.
My school doesn’t use Teams - can we still join the LSEN?
Yes! Even if your school doesn’t use Teams (e.g. you are a Google school) you and your students are still able to log on. You may need to do this through the web app and you may need to speak to your IT team about permissions. Get in touch if you are having issues.
How does my school join the LSEN?
School staff should email [email protected]. You’ll then receive meeting and event information and you’ll be sent a link to consent form for your students to fill out.
Please also see the Student FAQs for more information - LSEN Frequently Asked Questions.
Contact
If you would like to know more about Transform Our World, the UK Schools Sustainability Networks or any of our programmes, please get in touch.
Thank you for submitting your enquiry! We are currently receiving a large number of enquiries and are trying our best to get back to people as soon as possible. In the meantime, you might find one of the following links helpful:
- Are you a teacher? Learn about how to use the website here.
- Looking for teaching resources? You can find our collection of highly-rated resources here.
- Looking for something more long-term? Check out our featured programmes here.
- Want to see what other schools have been up to? Have a read of some case studies here.
- Alternatively, take a look at our FAQs and About pages as they might help to answer your question(s).
All the best,
The Transform Our World team
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