Projects with scope: Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

Total budget £90,000

Douglas Diggers in action

Douglas Diggers

2024-10-01  •  No comments  •  Claypotts Castle Primary Parent Council  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

The Douglas Diggers are formed of parents from Claypotts Castle PS who are committed to improving the physical environment of the school as well as the surrounding community spaces.  We are lucky to have a huge playground, but sadly it is simply an expanse of concrete and grass.  We have been working at pace this year on introducing native, hardy planting to the playground and creating opportunities for children and adults alike to learn more about gardening and growing.  We are at the start of a very exciting journey of transformation which will stand the test of time for many children to enjoy and learn from for years to come.

The vision for the Douglas Diggers has children at the heart, but very much surrounded by adults, old and young, with lots of gardening experience, or none at all.  We hope to create a space where all are welcome and feel valued; a space that embraces avid gardeners as well as those who simply wish to enjoy the surroundings of a living, growing garden. 

We are a school who are committed and attached to our families.  We do our very best to create many varied opportunities to involve our parents and carers and the Douglas Diggers have plans to offer many family-based activities this year from the creation of our Polycrub, the Claypotts Caterpillar to Family Fun Days and creative workshops during the winter months. 

Developing our outdoor spaces will create opportunities to: address the cost of living pressures, to reduce social isolation, to offer zero cost family activities and to create volunteering opportunities for those looking to start/return to work to name but a few.  Moreover, it encourages our families to claim the school space as their own whilst exploring the concept of climate change and the impact we can all have as citizens both individually and collectively.     

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Kickstarting a Greener Future

2024-09-30  •  No comments  •  kanzenkarate  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

Kanzen is a registered charitys committed to not only building better lives but also to making a positive impact on the environment. With our new initiative to introduce an electric vehicle, we aim to significantly reduce our carbon footprint and contribute to a greener, more sustainable future. This will help us cut harmful emissions, reduce reliance on fossil fuels, and set a strong example for other organisations in the community. It will also support us to remove barriers by providing accesible transport to those who need it. 

As well as reducing our carbon emmissions, an electric vehicle would also help us save money which we can then repurpose back into our charitable activities. 

Kanzen is an award winning charity and we are the current Dundee Social Enterprise of the Year, Dundee Sports Club of the Year and winners of The Courier Business Awards for Community Impact. 

We organised the first carbon neutral martial arts event in Europe and are proud to be an organisation rooted in the community. 

 

 

 

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Inspiring climate action through play

2024-10-01  •  No comments  •  Dundee Science Centre  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

Dundee Science Centre (DSC) is a lifelong learning resource committed to engaging and empowering our community with science whilst developing their skills. We will deliver a brand-new community engagement programme shining a light on climate change, through play and hands-on learning, to inspire action.  

Discover: We are experiencing a climate emergency. Our planet’s temperature is rising, biodiversity is decreasing and the change in our climate is having a devastating effect on life across the globe. Across Tayside, we have experienced record-breaking heatwaves and extreme flooding - putting our health and homes at risk. It’s important that we come together as a community to support each other and to protect our planet, now and for the future. Participants will discover how this has happened and the impact it will have on life on Earth through engaging demonstrations and hands-on learning.  

Explore: Dundee is at the forefront of climate action and adaption. Guided by the Sustainable Development Goals, we will explore ways in which our city and the surrounding areas can take action to build resilience to climate change and continue to grow in a climate positive way. 

Play: We will bring fun, engaging workshops and play-based activities into community centres and hubs across Dundee, alongside our community partners which include Dundee Bairns, Dundee Stroke and Exercise Group and Abertay Enviromental Science team including Dr Rebecca Wade. Our mission is to facilitate positive experiences with science, empower our community and to encourage them to connect with the natural world, embracing and protecting it for the future. 

Whilst the majority of the project delivery will take the form of in-person workshops throughout the community, we will also upskill community leaders and educators to ensure our work has a lasting legacy and provide resources for community centres to continue building their skills for years to come. Our programme development team utilise research informed learning practises and work closely with the Association of Science and Discovery Centres and the National Environment Reseach Council to bring the latest scientific developments to our audiences in exciting and meaningful ways. 

DSC will participate in community festivals, offering engaging and interactive experiences connected to our Climate Champions initiative. We will also host visits to our centre, where the public can explore sustainability through our award-winning exhibitions, guided by our expert science communicators. 

The environmental benefits of the project will include: 

Awareness Raising: Our team will provide a wide range of examples to establish a deep understanding of the global to local impacts of climate change.  

Community Engagement: We will work closely with a wide range of audiences to develop engaging and impactful workshops that allow them to take ownership over their own learning and apply their skills to help solve issues within their communities.  

Skills Development: Our team will raise the science capital and STEM skillset of participants as well as providing opportunities to improve critical thinking, literacy, numeracy and teamwork in informal settings. These transferrable skills will be beneficial in taking climate action but also in the personal and professional lives of the those involved.  

Climate Action & Adaption: The intended outcome of our work is to have our participants go out and take action in their local area that positively benefits the both the environment and their community.  

No action is too small or insignificant when it comes to creating a better world. Join us as we create Climate Champions across Tayside and play our part in driving meaningful climate action.    

Climate Action Workshops for Single Parent Families

Climate Action Workshops for Single Parent Families

2024-09-19  •  No comments  •  Angela Hendry  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

One Parent Families Scotland aim to deliver Climate Action Workshops offering a variety of sessions designed to empower single parents and families in Dundee to reduce their environmental footprint and create a more sustainable future.

Discovering how small changes can make a big difference in daily life through our sustainable living sessions. Learning to save money and reduce waste with our food waste reduction workshops. Discovering tips to save energy and money on utility bills in our energy efficiency sessions. Enjoying fun and educational activities with your children in our family-friendly workshops. Connecting with other like-minded individuals and become a Climate Champion in our community engagement sessions.

By participating in our workshops, single parent families will:

  • Gain valuable knowledge and skills.
  • Save money on household expenses.
  • Help protect the environment for future generations.
  • Connect with your community and make a positive impact.
Outside of DCA's Building.

DCA's Community Greenspace

2024-09-27  •  No comments  •  Dundee Contemporary Arts  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

“We can begin by doing small things at the local level, like planting community gardens or looking out for our neighbours. That is how change takes place in living systems, not from above but from within, from many local actions occurring simultaneously.” Grace Lee Boggs, American author and activist

 

Art has the power to help us to imagine and inspires action. We are launching a yearlong project to raise awareness of the climate emergency through the creation of a vibrant greenspace at DCA in partnership with community groups from across Dundee.

We will work with a Lead Artist to facilitate a series of workshops with community partners across the city to develop a welcoming greenspace onsite at DCA, which will be open to all and free to access.

We have established relationships Amina Muslim Women’s Resource Centre, Dundee International Women’s Centre (DIWC), Artangel, Maxwell Centre and Dundee Botanics. Through these partnerships, we will involve a diverse cross-section of people, including families and young people, in the co-design of our green space.

We will reach out to local experts to help shape this project, including Grow Dundee, an incredible network of existing food growing and community gardens, Bonnie Dundee, who maintain planters across the city, and Creative Dundee, who worked on various similar community-led projects.

Environmental benefits of this project include:

  • Community Engagement: Local communities will lead the creation of a greenspace, ensuring the space is what their community needs. 
  • Enhanced Urban Habitat: Promoting biodiversity and supporting ecosystems.
  • Improved Air Quality: Through the planting of trees and plants.
  • Emissions Offset: Contributing to carbon sequestration.

Further to this, there is robust evidence that integrating green spaces into urban environments enhances mental and physical health, improves wellbeing and aids relaxation.

The greenspace at DCA will provide a welcoming and safe social space in the centre of Dundee, benefiting DCA staff, visitors and local communities. The greenspace will be used for years to come, serving as the site of future workshops and events.

Join us in creating a welcoming, safe, and sustainable greenspace in the heart of Dundee! Thank you for your support.

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Green Gazebo: A place to connect 💚

2024-09-30  •  No comments  •  Nadege Depiesse-Borgeal  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

 

Campy Growers is the largest community growing space in Dundee. With passionate volunteers we grow and distribute hundreds of kilos of ethically grown food to various project across the city. We run workshops about gardening, biodiversity, cooking, harvest and wider events open to all, to raise awareness about climate change and food growing.  

What's missing is a location to run all our projects and activities: a living roof green gazebo. A place to gather, to share ideas and knowledge, to enjoy the sun whilst protected from the Scottish weather. A place with a positive climate impact. A place that will make the difference. 

Picture a L-shaped wooden gazebo, south facing and made from larch sourced from a local sawmill. Can you see it? It will have a guttering system to collect water so we can wash the produce and water our plants. But most of off all, it will have a sedum (green) roof which will capture CO2 emissions and support wildlife, improve air purification, increase biodiversity, and more.   

It will become a social space for the Collective and a central point for learning:  

  •  We will run more workshops and events in relation to gardening, cooking, biodiversity and resilience. Although we ran several workshops last year, we were quite limited in terms of space, so we want to expand and make people feel welcome! Here is a wee taster of what we are planning for 2025: start your garden, botany, Harvest session, mushroom growing, cooking with seasonal veg, fermentation, learn about moths and bat, movie screening, open days and more.   
  • Start a Climate Café style conversation: Every month we will run climate café style conversation giving the opportunity to everybody to share their thoughts about climate change. Campy Growers is an example of a proactive project which counter-act climate change. Being surrounded by food and green space changes the dynamic and impact of such conversations can have.    
  • We will offer a space for our volunteers and visitors:  With our volunteers and visitors we talk about gardening for sure, but we also create connections, share aspirations and ideas. A dedicated area to relax, think, gather and enjoy homemade food together is the key of our Collective   
  • We will use it as a packhouse for our weekly veg stalls and distribution, an open space visible to all visitors who want to get some vegetables or learn about community market gardening techniques. It is a self-sufficient space with its guttering system too. 

 

We need your vote to create to social space which will support the biodiversity and will allow us to run more events and workshop creating resilience and awareness about climate change and food growing.   

 

The World is My...

The World is My...

2024-09-25  •  No comments  •  Yolanda Aguilar  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

Enter 'The World is My...' an immersive and participatory dance-theatre show for the 10-12 years old on climate crisis, eco-anxiety, and how to transform from eco-worriers into eco-warriors! 

Follow the two characters as they dance their way through the recovered Lego washed-out pieces that continue to reach the Cornish shores from a 1997 drifting steel container on its way to New York, the Tokio Express. 

The project covers two weeks of rehearsals and two weeks of performance shows in Dundee (up to 20 shows, and 2,000 audiences). It is a development phase from a previous period supported by Aberdeen Creative Learning where the team became company in residence in two primary schools in Aberdeen. We learnt facts from great partners such as the James Hutton Institute in Aberdeen, a world-leading scientific research organisation; as well as from local partners like the amazing Transition Dundee. 

Following this learning, which included the children’s feedback, we will continue to develop the show and perform it, this time in Dundee, exploring the power of creativity in conveying transformational and long-lasting messages for radical environmental change. 

Your support will help both the dissemination of key learning for the young children of Dundee and the exposure to performing arts activities in schools, contributing to implement the Article 31 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, with relation to accessing play, cultural activities, and recreational activities. 

A multi-award-wining organisation with a 10-year long-standing partnership with NHS Tayside delivering the smoking awareness programme Well Good reaching 7,000 children per year (yep…70,000 so far!), we know how to provide engaging and inspiring learning, but we need your help. 

If you want to contribute to this project, becoming a community producer…Vote for us! 

Many thanks. 

ScrapAntics Resilience Worker

2024-09-30  •  No comments  •  ScrapAntics  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

ScrapAntics would like to begin a new project by employing a Resilience Worker. Their role would be to connect with the most vulnerable in our community, providing them with essential resources and items, offering accessible advice and education on climate action and exploring tangible changes people can make to emphasise sustainability in day-to-day life.                                             

The Resilience Worker would get to know individuals and families on a one to one basis, initiating conversations around climate topics and encouraging them to enact change in their lives, with the aim of positively impacting wider community change.

The worker would identify what direct support or signposting to agencies addressing financial, food or fuel poverty is most needed.

ScrapAntics have access to corporate donations of household essentials and many in our community are in desperate need of these items - but do not currently have the capacity for targeted distribution. The Resilience Worker would ensure that they reach people who need them most. These include bedding, towels, toiletries and cleaning supplies, food packs and clothing.

This role would particularly benefit those we work with in our Wellgate space who are often unemployed, from an asylum seeker or refugee background, have mental or physical health issues or suffer from isolation.

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Dundee Schools - #RefillDundee

2024-09-30  •  No comments  •  Bluewater  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

Global plastic bottle consumption continues at the alarming rate of 600 billion plastic bottles per year.  Only around 9% of waste plastics are recycled, meaning that the remainder end up being landfilled, incinerated, or leaking out into our natural environment to pollute our lakes, rivers, oceans, and our food system.  Although we have been led to believe that bottled water is better than tap, researchers are now raising the alarm on worrying levels of microplastic and nanoplastic being detected in bottled water.  Trust in tap water quality is also at an all-time global low.

Bluewater works to tackle plastic waste and transform behaviours towards more sustainable hydration practices by innovating next-generation drinking water dispensing solutions for home, work, and play.  Bluewater solutions use advanced water purification and mineralisation technologies to create pure, delicious, and planet-friendly drinking water when and where it's needed, thereby ending the reliance on polluting single-use plastics.  Our project proposal seeks to place a Bluewater Flow refill solution at each of the 8 state-run secondary schools in Dundee.  The dispensers will therefore provide an innovative and sustainable premium and health-focused drinking water refill solution for staff, pupils and guests to the schools.

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Delivering environmental activities and events at Growing Chrysalis

2024-09-23  •  No comments  •  Scottish Action for Mental Health  •  Dundee Climate Fund Round 3.0

Scottish Action for Mental Health (SAMH) will deliver a year-long programme of environmental projects and activities at Growing Chrysalis, the community garden in the heart of Dawson Park. Our goal is to give individuals and families from across the region the chance to step outside and reconnect with nature.

Our programme will blend environmental awareness with therapeutic gardening to create a space where people can thrive alongside nature. Families will learn how climate change impacts our greenspaces and local wildlife, gain practical skills to help create a more sustainable future, and improve their wellbeing from being outdoors surrounded by nature.

All our activities will be dynamic and inclusive, tailored to meet the diverse needs of everyone who joins. These will include:

  • Green Minds Sessions: Weekly garden-based activities focused on gardening, wildlife, and creativity. Each session ends with time to connect socially, building stronger bonds within the community.
  • Local Produce Festivals: Celebrate Tayside’s rich agricultural heritage with events highlighting local produce—potatoes, soft fruits, and berries.
  • Recycle Fun Days: Family-friendly events promoting sustainability through fun, hands-on activities using recycled materials.
  • Grow Your Own Food Workshops: Practical sessions on sourcing and growing local, seasonal food—from foraging to creating your own food forest.
  • Saving Local Wildlife: Learn about the impact of climate change on local wildlife and how to protect our precious wildlife with sessions on growing wildflowers for pollinators, building bat boxes, and creating wormery composts.
  • Reducing Food Waste: Sustainable cooking sessions using homegrown produce, held in our outdoor kitchen to strengthen healthy eating and social connections.