The International School of Penang (Uplands) is the oldest international school on the island of Penang and being surrounded by so much beautiful nature means that we serve as both enjoyers and protectors of it. By embedding the UN Sustainable Development Goals into our long-term strategic plan and in keeping up with our school motto “Respect for self; respect for others”, we have developed sustainable practices and initiatives within the school in the following areas: 

Education for Sustainable Development: ESD is embedded across our programs and our units of inquiry actively seek to support and connect with the UN SDGs. All stakeholders including our students, teaching faculty, enabling staff, and parents, have been involved and supported in learning about the SDGs and all service as action projects are directly linked to the UN SDGs. 

Student Engagement and Leadership: We have an extensive CCA program which addresses 5 key areas (Sports and Physical wellbeing, Art & Creativity, Languages & Culture, Sciences & Technology, and student engagement), all of which support the UN SDGs. Added to our TASS Ambassadors, we also have the primary gardening club, the primary and secondary sustainability clubs, and the secondary Do Something Society. We also have our Year 13 Sustainability prefects who works closely with these groups in order to support change and sustainable development throughout the learning community 

Climate Change as an Impact: As of August 2024 we have actively started tracking our food waste, paper waste, and our electricity and water consumption. We have solar panels installed and our buildings and infrastructure have been adapted over the summer to lessen our environmental impact. We run a primary gardening program which sees many of our herbs and plants being used in the canteen and food tech classes.

Trips & Events: Working with various stakeholders, we try to consider our environmental and social impacts for all trips and events. These include overnight trips, day trips, parent-run events, and sporting events. 

Memberships & Programs: In addition to being a TASS member, we also have a number of Global Schools Advocates on our teaching faculty who lead and support Education for Sustainable Development. 

Future projects: Expanding on our student engagement and taking action against climate change, developing a better stronger circular economy (we currently have a second hand uniform market but would like to see this grow), and we will be working towards a 10% waste- reduction challenge from January. While we are at the budding stage of our sustainability journey, we are very proud of the progress we have made in just 5 months.