The Council for Sustainable Development (the Council) launched the first round of Sustainable Development School Award Programme (the Programme) in July 2007 to encourage schools to participate in activities organized by the Council and the Sustainable Development Fund recipients; and to help promote the concept of sustainable development (SD) and practices in schools and the community through various means.

The Programme aims at introducing the concept of SD to secondary school students; raising their awareness of the importance of SD; encouraging them to apply the SD principles in their daily lives and help spread the SD message to their families and within their communities; as well as creating a SD network at the community level and building capacity for interested parties to organize and participate in public engagement processes or other SD-related events in future.

The Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards will be presented to qualified schools to recognize their efforts in promoting and practicing the SD concept. The criteria are set out below.

Bronze Award:

A school will be qualified for a Bronze Award if it has, during the programme period, participated in 3 or more events/activities sponsored by the Council or the Sustainable Development Fund, with a total attendance of 400 student counts or more.

Silver Award:

A school will be qualified for a Silver Award if it has, during the programme period, initiated a campaign which promotes the concept of SD and encourages such practices among students in the school, in addition to meeting the qualifications for a Bronze Award.

Gold Award:

A school will be qualified for a Gold Award if it has, during the programme period, initiated a campaign to involve parents, local residents and/or institutions and organizations with a view to promoting SD awareness and practices at the local community level, in addition to meeting the qualifications for a Silver Award.

Outstanding Performance Award:

The award will be presented to one school with outstanding performance among the Gold Award winning schools.

Devotion to Promotion of Sustainable Development Honors Award:

This award will be presented to the school which is qualified for the Gold Award for three consecutive years in order to recognize its efforts and contributions to the promotion of SD.

There were a total of 53 secondary schools joined the 2007-2008 SD School Award Programme. Among these schools, 11 were qualified for the Gold Award, 12 for the Silver Award and 10 for the Bronze Award. Around 32,000 students as well as teachers, parents and members of the community were involved in the Programme. The Prize Presentation Ceremony of the 2007-2008 SD School Award Programme was held on 21 February 2009 at the Hong Kong Academy of Medicine with attendance of 600 guests, principals, teachers, students and members of the community.

The Council has launched the second round of SD School Award Programme in January 2009 and the programme will last till 31 August 2010. All secondary schools are invited to join this meaningful activity and collaborate with the Council to build Hong Kong a sustainable city. For enquiries on the Programme, please contact Mr Wong of Secretariat at 3150 8180.