Sustainability

We’re committed to making a difference to the environment. Our goal is to minimise our environmental impact while growing our sustainable practices.

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Playing our role

Sustainability is one of our key values at Otago Polytechnic, influencing our day-to-day operations and the way we teach our programmes. On campus we have vigorous composting and recycling programmes, and our students and staff are encouraged to lead green initiatives.

  • we measure our greenhouse gas emissions and publicly report on them
  • we set a public emissions reduction target consistent with keeping within 2° of warming and have committed to being carbon neutral by 2030
  • we have committed to 100% of our undergraduate programmes directly addressing issues of sustainable practice

Read our Simple Pledge Towards Sustainable Practice

Sustainable strategy

Sustainability is a cornerstone of our decision-making and strategy as an organisation. From our operations and teaching, to our engagement with businesses, communities and other institutions, we believe sustainability is a key part of building a better future.

Our goal is for every student to graduate with the skills and knowledge to become sustainable practitioners in their chosen fields. We're also working towards using our campus as a ‘sustainability model’ for others to follow.

Our vision for sustainability includes:

  • developing a framework to ensure we meet our sustainability objectives
  • exploring the challenges, and asking the hard questions
  • focusing on student engagement by weaving sustainable practice into all our programmes
  • making long-term sustainability goals to work towards
  • turning vision into practice by ‘walking the talk’
Living campus gardens

Living campus gardens

Everyone is welcome to harvest from our vibrant community garden at our Dunedin campus.

Benefitting communities

OP is involved in a number of initiatives, including community projects and volunteer work. We are committed to being a socially responsible organisation. We want communities to benefit from our actions, and for our students and staff to be active participants in caring for our wider communities.

Teaching sustainable practice

We integrate sustainable practice into all our educational programmes as well as providing a range of qualifications in sustainable practice. From construction to nursing, design to engineering and beyond, learning sustainable practices sets our students up to think green as a natural part of their practices.

Our students are also involved in research projects with a sustainability focus, enabling them to develop new responses to environmental and social challenges. Our goal is that every graduate has the skills and knowledge to act as a sustainable practitioner in their field.

Animal ethics

We promote practices to ensure ethical obligations are met when handling animals on campus and in teaching and research.

Animal ethics

Working sustainably

Our goal is to minimise our environmental footprint and to share our sustainability journey with others. We have a range of on-campus initiatives, from the Living Campus project and Sustainable Lens, to the Waste Exchange initiative, energy monitoring and sustainable purchasing.Explore more about these initiatives, and others in our Make a Difference Guide

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Pōpopo Wormporium

Our campus worm farm, Pōpopo, turns our food waste into compost that will nurture our gardens. Pōpopo also offers a great educational experience to visitors, showing sustainability in action.

Contact us

If you’re not sure what to study and would like some guidance, we’re here to help. Feel free to chat to us directly about any questions you may have.