What did 2024 look like?

We've picked some of the highlights from across the year. Here's a round-up from Solar for Schools and The Solar for Schools CBS, too.

JANUARY

Education is the central pillar of the Solar for Schools’s mission, so it was great to finally recruit a Head of Education. Wendy Litherland joined us at the start of the year with 25 years of award-winning science teaching under her belt, and a very strong focus on sustainability. Wendy has been a Director of the CBS for four years, and in that time has been central in working with our schools and developing our mobile app. It’s great to now have Wendy within Solar Options for Schools, bringing with her such a richness of expertise, knowledge and an enormous passion around sustainable education.

Read about Wendy’s trip to Munich at the start of the year when she visited the workshop at which some of our Solar Explorer Kits were built.

MARCH

British Science Week is always an important event for us, but this year we had - for the first time - a full education team and were able to visit six schools across the week, meeting an amazing 2000 students, inspiring many of them with hands-on and in-person assemblies, demos and workshops. Read about one of those visits , at Kings Norton Boys School, here.

APRIL

April marked the start of a major new partnership with National Grid announced as part of £2.7m commitment by them to help more schools cut carbon emissions and make dramatic savings to their energy bills. The innovative funding initiative formed part of a five-year pledge by National Grid to help schools in areas of high economic deprivation to reach net zero goals. Solar for Schools has worked with National Grid to allocate this grant money to projects that need it most, in order to make them viable.

So far, the grant has helped unlock solar projects on schools that would otherwise not be able to go solar. Through an investment so far of £480K, National Grid has helped 46 schools get approved for solar. The collective energy savings are forecast to be around £12m across those schools, over the lifetime of the solar projects.

Find out more about how partnerships like this can drive real change here.

MAY

We hosted our first webinar introducing three of the directors of the CBS to investors, partners and potential supporters. It was a great discussion which attracted some very engaged questions. You can watch back on the webinar here to learn more about the nuts and bolts of how the CBS fundraises to ensure maximum impact for schools looking to reduce their carbon footprint.

JUNE

In June, Wendy Litherland led the 15th Annual Sustainability Learning Conference in the North West. The event welcomed over 600 students from around 60 schools from the region, including 200 senior leaders from within those schools as well as industry experts. Solar for Schools sponsored a programme for teachers in CPD (continued professional development). Watch a short video of highlights from the event.

AUGUST

In August, we welcomed our first university placement recruit, Alison Ashworth, who joined us as an environmental educator. Read about Ally's role and how she finds being part of the Solar for Schools team in her blog here.

SEPTEMBER

Another major new partnership was formed in September, when The Solar for Schools Community Benefit Society (CBS) announced a new finance initiative with Triodos Bank – one of the world’s leading ethical banks - to help grow its network of solar-powered schools. In supporting the CBS in this way, Triodos Bank has created a blueprint for scaling community-led finance. Find out more here.

NOVEMBER

As we scale our impact, to reach more students with hands-on education around solar and sustainability, we need to multiply our army of educators. And in November, we did just that, when we welcomed 10 awesome new school educators. This wonderful new team will be visiting schools up and down the country delivering engaging, in-person workshops around energy, sustainability and how schools play a really important role in this. Here they are (below) with Solar for Schools’ Danielle Parker, Shannon Jackson and Alison Ashworth during their first training session, hosted very kindly by Ark Victoria Academy

In November, we also held our first Parliamentary Showcase event, co-organised and sponsored by Chamber UK.

We welcomed 40 pupils from seven schools around the country who proudly showcased the work their schools are doing to fight climate change and drive more sustainable behaviour across their community and beyond.

The event attracted over 20 MPs and a key focus was how local action leads to broader change. As part of the event, we asked the attending schools to submit a short video about the action they’re taking within their school community. You can watch one of our favourite short films, from Churchfields Junior School, here.

Watch our CEO Robert Schrimpff's speech at the event here, where he talks about why education is so fundamental in empowering and inspiring the next generation if we're to stand a chance with slowing the pace of climate change.

DECEMBER

Following the success of the Parliamentary event, we now have around 20 very engaged MPs who are working closely with us, with local government, schools and other community energy partners to ramp up the efforts, in getting solar - and the education that comes with it - on many more schools across the country. December has seen the first few MP school visits, and one of those visits was from Judith Cummins MP, and Deputy Speaker of the House, who spent a morning at St John's CE Primary School, part of BDAT.

Finally, as we reach the end of the year, the CBS has launched its XII Bond Offer, open until the end of February.

To support and grow the vital education which forms such a central part of our work, the solar that we instal on school rooftops provides a way to fund that education, and to make each solar project viable, we fundraise via the CBS. It’s largely thanks to bondholders - who invest from as little as £50 – that the economics of every solar project work. This, in turn, unlocks the powerful educational opportunities for young people.

There are two ways to support the CBS, either direct via the CBS website or, through an IFISA eligible investment via our ethical funding partner, Ethex.

If you want to be part of this journey, found out more here.