Climate, Coffee, Crisis – where do SU’s fit in?

The current generation of students has been left to bear the increasingly threatening consequences of the climate crisis.

We are expected to “solve” a disaster we had no hand in creating. And we are the ones who will keep living on this burning planet, with no realistic sign that the change we need is coming.

The People’s Emergency Briefing (PEB) is calling for a wartime-scale response to the climate and nature crisis. Students’ unions have a responsibility to join the movement. They should also keep calling on institutions, leaders and the government to protect the people and places they are supposed to serve.

Your SU is probably the biggest youth charity in the local area. It’s one of the few places that can bring your MP, councillors and university executives into one room with the people most affected by climate change. A PEB screening is a simple way to do it.

The University of Southampton Students’ Union was one of the first SUs to host one, in partnership with the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust. You register on the website and you’re sent the film and guidance on how to run it. We opened it to everyone, including students, staff and members of the public.

The SU was able to capture an engaged audience of the people most affected by climate change, who have the energy, passion, or power to do something.

Invite decision makers and don’t set an agenda

We emailed mayoral candidates, councillors and MPs asking them to attend. We even invited our new vice chancellor on his first day.

By framing the discussion to be about flagship institutions such as Universities, the question of climate change isn’t made to be the burden of the young but a questioning of leadership.

The screening was followed by a discussion over plant-based refreshments, prompted simply by a reflection on the film. Points ranged from moving the university to plant-based by default to the new Burnham government’s refusal to rule out new North Sea drilling.

Everyone agreed that action needed to come from our leaders. So we asked the audience a pointed question: “what does good leadership look like when it comes to the climate crisis?”

What was important was for these conversations to happen. By facilitating this screening without a set agenda, we created a constructive and honest discussion between the decision makers and stakeholders.

Scrutinise your university and widen your audience

The leadership question naturally led students and some staff to pull apart the university’s sustainability strategy.

The strategy commits the university to tackling the climate crisis, but students and staff said its actions told a different story. They pointed to a lack of investment in renewable energy, no full divestment from fossil fuels, and no policy for managing the trees on campus.

Working with the Wildlife Trust made the screening more welcoming to the wider public, who had their say too.

Audiences for these events are usually the ones you’d expect to see at village halls, boathouses and churches. Those spaces still carry real influence. But an SU screening, with tickets on Eventbrite, reaches further.

It brought in those most fearful of the crisis, those who care, and the students so often told in induction and graduation speeches that they will solve a crisis they never created.

Play the hand we’ve been dealt

So why aren’t more SUs taking this opportunity, when it’s so simple and the resources are right on their doorstep? The most preparation you’re likely to need is understanding your university’s sustainability policy so you can scrutinise it properly.

The climate crisis might not feel like the most pressing issue right now. There are other big ones at hand, like the cost of living crisis. But as the film points out, the climate crisis is linked to everything else that’s happening. We need more pressure on our decision makers. If we don’t have a planet to live on, we can’t solve any of today’s other problems.

Students are one of the largest pressure groups in the country. Putting that passion in one room with people who have the power to change things fills it with hope, activism and solidarity. The film asks MPs to back a national emergency briefing, like those held during Covid-19, so everyone understands the challenges the climate crisis brings. Students should be at the centre of those discussions.

As the generation left to cope with the consequences, we’re the ones who will keep the conversation going. That’s why we will host a second screening in spring. It’s also why we’re urging other SUs to host one too.