{"id":3749,"date":"2025-12-23T10:21:32","date_gmt":"2025-12-23T10:21:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/buddingnews\/?p=3749"},"modified":"2025-12-23T10:21:34","modified_gmt":"2025-12-23T10:21:34","slug":"what-do-people-really-think-about-our-campus-green-spaces","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/buddingnews\/2025\/12\/23\/what-do-people-really-think-about-our-campus-green-spaces\/","title":{"rendered":"What do people really think about our campus green spaces?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>By Rosalind Shaw, Sustainability Manager for Biodiversity, and Holly Locke, MSc Global Sustainability Solutions<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Our campuses are full of beautiful green spaces \u2014 trees, wildflowers, woodlands, ponds and streams. These spaces aren\u2019t just good for biodiversity; they\u2019re good for us too. Research shows that spending time in green and blue spaces can reduce stress and boost wellbeing.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As part of our&nbsp;<strong>Nature Positive Strategy<\/strong>, we wanted to find out:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul>\n<li>How do people use campus green spaces?\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>How do they feel about them?\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>What benefits do they get?\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>So, in April and May 2025, we ran our first\u00a0<strong>Campus Green Space Survey<\/strong>. Holly, during her MSc placement, led the charge \u2014 armed with a QR code and plenty of enthusiasm \u2014 to gather people\u2019s thoughts.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/sustainabilityspace\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/547\/2025\/12\/Holly.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-775\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Holly surveying people in the Lower Hoopern Valley<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>What did we learn?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What really shone through from the survey and Holly\u2019s chats with people was how much people value the campus green spaces and how important they were for people. People love our green spaces! Out of the 419 people who responded:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul>\n<li><strong>62%<\/strong>\u00a0use them for travel\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>67%<\/strong>\u00a0for wellbeing\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>60%<\/strong>\u00a0for socialising\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>52%<\/strong>\u00a0for informal exercise like walking or running\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>One colleague summed it up perfectly:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe uplift to my wellbeing that these spaces afford \u2014 the tranquillity, space, connection with nature \u2014 I really, really value the green spaces here.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>People\u2019s favourite things about campus green spaces were often about nature, just being able to be in them, the quiet and peaceful nature of them and using them to socialise with other people. Lots of people didn\u2019t have a \u2018least favourite\u2019 thing but there were some comments around the loss of areas due to building works, litter and not enough benches.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/sustainabilityspace\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/547\/2025\/12\/graph6v2resize.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-783\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Responses to the survey question \u2018The University campuses have green spaces that\u2026\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>What\u2019s next?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Your feedback is shaping our plans:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul>\n<li>When asked what they would like to see more of, most comments were around opportunities to engage with campus green spaces, so we are looking to run more events (including shorter lunchtime and late-afternoon sessions, so that people can fit them around work)\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Exploring\u00a0<strong>new benches<\/strong>\u00a0with the Grounds team\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Repeating the survey in 2027 to track progress\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Thank you to everyone who took part!&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Want the full report? Email\u00a0<strong>sustainability@exeter.ac.uk<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Interested in events? Check out the Grounds team\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.exeter.ac.uk\/about\/gardens\/volunteering\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">volunteering page<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Rosalind Shaw, Sustainability Manager for Biodiversity, and Holly Locke, MSc Global Sustainability Solutions Our campuses are full of beautiful green spaces \u2014 trees, wildflowers, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1117,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,75,93,171,217],"tags":[385,2087,1901,1071,2085,1241],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>What do people really think about our campus green spaces? - Budding news<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/buddingnews\/2025\/12\/23\/what-do-people-really-think-about-our-campus-green-spaces\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"What do people really think about our campus green spaces? 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