FEATURE FOCUS: SUSTAINABILITY
How the right IT choices can shrink the carbon footprints of schools and make budgets go further
T
he climate crisis affects us all - especially future generations. As the institutions primarily responsible for educating our young people, many schools are working hard to teach pupils about sustainability and adopt more climate-friendly habits. Organisations like the Green Schools Project and Let’s Go Zero are partnering with UK educational leaders to embed climate education into their curriculums and help them become more sustainable through a range of training, support and resources.
Schools are also under increasing pressure from the Government, parents and pupils to mitigate their own climate impact. Estimates suggest that in England alone, schools account for around 9.4 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions every year. In its Sustainability and Climate Change strategy, the UK Government says that by 2025 every education setting must have nominated a ‘sustainability lead’ responsible for putting climate action plans in place.
The education sector is tackling these challenges while dealing with ever tightening budgets, while the ‘green transition’ is often discussed as something that must involve higher costs and lower standards. Yet there are many
ways schools can reduce their climate impact without sacrifice, and recent data shows when it comes to schools’ educational hardware - lower Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), higher value and improved sustainability can all go hand in hand.
How educational hardware can reduce schools’ environmental impact As education becomes increasingly digital, many schools are using more laptops and other mobile devices as part of their teaching, and the hardware choices schools make can have a significant impact on their carbon footprint. In a recent research report, Hardware TCO Concerns Driving a Flight to Quality, Microsoft interviewed IT decision-makers (ITDMs) across a range of organisations, including those from the education sector, to better understand their views in the current purchasing environment. The findings revealed the average laptop lifecycle is now 3.2 years, but encouragingly, 74% of ITDMs are looking to stretch this out, with an extension of 1-2 years being planned by most (63%).
Why? Because, as 76% of respondents agree, reducing hardware purchase frequency saves money. This also makes a clear contribution to schools’ sustainability efforts by reducing consumption and waste, although it’s
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worth noting the extent to which improving TCO and sustainability by extending lifecycle length is dependent on build quality. Indeed, the top three features that respondents to our TCO research consider important, are:
• Reliability – including consistent performance, without failure (58%)
• High specifications – including device power, speed, and battery life (56%)
• Durability – including the ability to withstand wear and tear (58%)
Durability and repairability are also deeply intertwined. As part of Microsoft’s commitments to become carbon negative, water positive and achieve zero waste by 2030, the Surface portfolio is circular by design, adopting a repair, reuse and recycle model that minimises waste and helps to extend the lifespan of devices for as long as possible. The recently launched Surface Go 4, for example, is ideal for primary school students. It’s highly portable and lightweight for carrying between classes, includes touch and inking – so students can write, draw, take handwritten notes, and mark up assignments, and has an HD camera for virtual classes as well as a long-lasting battery for the whole school day.
December 2023
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