To mark Earth Day on Tuesday 22nd April 2025 and Europe Day in May, a climate survey was conducted by students in the EPAS (European Parliament Ambassador School) Programme at USP College and members of the USP College Student Union, which was led and organised by EPAS junior ambassador Sebastian Rapley Mende, to collect data on what students and staff felt about the environment, climate change and sustainability both inside the college and in the wider world and Europe in particular.

This survey was conducted as a questionnaire using Microsoft Forms, consisting of 15 questions: 10 questions pulled directly from the EIB (European Investment Bank) Annual Climate Survey 2024 and 5 questions relating to the college itself by the EPAS team. Students and staff answered anonymously across both the Seevic and Palmers campuses, where the Student Union and EPAS are active.

There were a total 346 responses, 218 from students at our main Palmer’s Campus and 121 from our students at our smaller Seevic Campus. This was out of a total of 483 staff and roughly 4,000 students, resulting in a turnout of 7.7%. Of the total 346 responses, 339 were students and 7 responses were from a staff member. This means that this survey is mostly a reflection of the views of students at USP College.

The EIB Survey was used both to see the views of responders and to see how this compares to that of European and American respondents, for EPAS, allowing us to see the similarities and differences between the college and Europe, for certain topics within sustainability.

Overall, the survey, both the EIB part and the college part, was successful at demonstrating what the students at USP College thought about sustainability and the climate and their views on what the college and Europe should do about sustainability. For the most part, results were consistent with each other and the data collected will be useful in pinpointing specifically what the college should do next to improve its sustainability even further.

Thank you to the staff at USP, the Student Union and the EPAS team for helping with this project and thank you to all the people at USP College who participated in this survey! Next month, these issues will be brought forward to the college and, hopefully, we will hear what the college will do to improve sustainability. We also hope policymakers from the EU will listen to the opinions of young people like us all over Europe regarding this issue, so that climate and sustainability policy is done with our views in mind.