What’s our vision?

What’s on this page:

We believe that ever young person should have the chance to spend a year doing paid environmental work, addressing the growing gap between what needs to be done and the capacity to make it happen

To make that reality, we empower environmental organisations to create accessible new entry-level opportunities, and we support marginalised (ethnically, economically, geographically, or with disabilities) young (18-25) people to flourish within them.

The problem we’re looking to fix

Despite overwhelming calls for more action, the UK still lacks the funding, skills, and capacity needed to meet its environmental targets.

For young people, this inaction leaves them facing an environmental catastrophe that will dominate the rest of their lives. They want to be part of the solution but find themselves without the opportunities and belief that they can make a real impact. 

Young man in a grey sweatshirt and black hatbent down planting a tree

Yet the environmental talent pipeline is broken: there are too few opportunities available for too few people.

Pathways into the sector are unclear and unfair, and organisations are missing out on the diverse talent needed to address the issues we’re facing.

The next generation deserves accessible, hands-on work opportunities where they can build the knowledge, skills, and confidence to become the environmental leaders we need to create a better future for our planet.

We want to:

  • Expand the pipes, enabling new entry-level opportunities at all kinds of organisations working to ensure we can live sustainably within our natural planetary boundaries.

  • Streamline the process, making the roles easy to access, easy to fill, and creating conditions where everyone can flourish.

  • Redirect the funnel, prioritising young people from marginalised and historically underserved backgrounds to build an environmental workforce that represents the whole of our society.

How we’ll fix it

We’re going to fix the environmental talent pipeline from both sides:

For young people

We streamline the pathways into the sector, connecting young people to incredible opportunities and supporting them to thrive within them.

For organisations

We empower leading environmental employers to create exciting, new, entry-level opportunities and support them to get the most out of their talented teams.

In practice, this looks like the following key interventions:

FOR YOUNG PEOPLE

FOR
EMPLOYERS

Pre-employment

Building awareness
We engage young people, particularly those who might not historically have been able access to environmental careers, working to build awareness and interest through both local community networks and through our online platforms.

Accessible interviewing
We make sure every role created through our programme is genuinely entry level, and we ensure hosts adopt fair and inclusive processes that level the playing field by prioritising attitude over experience.

Access to diverse talent
We help employers tap into new talent pools, supporting them to recruit the best candidates who can bring incredible energy, passion and new perspectives that will help strengthen their teams.

Subsidised salary costs
For smaller organisations and charities we help offer wage subsidies on a tiered basis to help create the roles. Where applicable, we also help to streamline applications for funding, both for charities and to access skills levy pots.

During placements

Environmental placements
Trainees will spend a year working on the front-line of the environmental and bio-diversity crises. They’ll get paid to be part of the solution, learning valuable skills and gaining new experiences and connections that will set them up to pursue great green careers.

Environmental placements
The trainees will help their host organisations extend their impact, both in the direct work that they do, and also the social impact that the organisation has within its wider community, helping to build economic potential as part of a just green transition.

Learning and support
Every trainee will get to paticipate in our ongoing learning and support programme including bespoke training focused on universal workplace skills as well as access to 1-2-1 coaching sessions with a dedicated youth coach

Cross-cohort network
We bring our trainees together so they don’t feel alone in their first working experiences, with opportunities to meet in-person, sharing experiences and swapping notes on their placements.

Organisational development
All host organisations also have access to a facilitated peer-led learning programme focused on building an inclusive and equitable culture that can nurture the next generation of talent for the sector.

Post placements

Building a career
When they graduate, we help the trainees to identify the careers they want to pursue and connect them to potential future employers, supporting them to showcase the incredible experiences and skills they’ve gained through their placement.

Connecting to future talent
Employers on the programme will be able to recruit other trainees once they graduate, confident that they have been able to build valuable skills and experience during the year that can add value to their organisations.

The impact we
want to have

We believe that this has the potential to offer significant, long-term, systemic benefits that go beyond the immediate environmental impact through the work our trainees do.

While the focus within the year will be on helping protect our planet from ecological and climate catastrophe, the experience and the way the programme is structured will help address longer-term and systemic challenges:

  • There will be immediate benefits through the work that young people do, from carbon sequestration to nature recovery, public engagement to climate mitigation.

    Further down the line, as they continue to build careers centred on environmental protection/recovery,  in or out of the sector, our participants will continue to address environmental issues and deliver the solutions we need.

  • Throughout the year we want to help our participants build skills that they can transfer to future roles, helping to develop a skilled and productive green workforce that can shape future growth within the UK economy.

    There is also the opportunity within the programme to target the investments being made to communities where the need is greatest, helping address economic inequalities as well as environmental concerns.

  • We are an actively antiracist organisation, seeking to undo a national legacy of isolating minority ethnic communities from the natural environment.

    We’ve designed the programme to enable greater inclusion within the sector, creating opportunities for young people from diverse and disadvantaged communities to flourish.

    It’s also an opportunity to connect participants within and across different communities, helping build social capital and bridge divides in an increasingly divided society.

  • More than any other generation, young people will feel the physical and mental health impacts of a crumbling environment. They are already the most afflicted group when it comes to eco-anxiety.

    Building nature connectedness and offering opportunities to be part of the solution can help alleviate mental stresses, and embedding healthy habits through the programme can encourage longer-term prevention, reducing the burden on an already overstretched healthcare system