My initiative is designed for and delivered in London
Yes
I am 18 years of age or above, by the application deadline.
Yes
My organisation is a registered UK entity and has a London-based address.
Yes
My organisation is a non-profit (e.g. school, university, or local authority) — not a for-profit, which can only join as a partner.
Yes
If there is a for-profit organisation as a partner in my initiative, they work on a cost-recovery basis only.
Yes
My solution is implemented at scale, or if not, I have a clear business plan, a minimum viable solution (prototype, pilot, or proof of concept), and evidence of work or impact in London within your coalition.
Yes
I am aware that, if I am submitting more than one application to a Challenge run by Ashoka and Go! London, only one of them is able to progress through the stages.
Yes
Are you an employee (and their children and grandchildren) of Ashoka or any of its respective affiliates and participating advertising and promotion agencies?
No
I have read and accepted the Challenge Terms & Conditions
1
First Name
Last Name
Pronouns
Email address
I would like to receive notifications and updates about Go London!, Ashoka, Ashoka Changemakers, and other Ashoka opportunities.
Are you an Ashoka Fellow?
Are you applying from an organization founded by an Ashoka Fellow?
If you are applying from an organization founded by an Ashoka Fellow, please specify the name and organisation of the fellow below.
Initiative Title
Green Adventures
Lead Organization Name
High Trees Community Development Trust
My initiative is designed for and delivered in London
1
Year that you started/ registered your organisation
1998
Website URL(s) or Social Media Handles
www.high-trees.org https://www.instagram.com/high_treescdt/ https://x.com/HighTreesCDT https://uk.linkedin.com/company/high-trees-community-development-trust
Initiative Stage
Pilot-Stage (The first activities have happened, and you have proof of concept)
Sectors/Themes: What topic does your project most directly relate to?
Children & Youth
Initiative Summary: Describe your initiative in one sentence
Green Adventures elevates adventure playgrounds as vital community sports and play spaces, transforming them into greener, climate-resilient environments that enable sustained physical activity and empower young people to take collective social action on climate change in spaces they know and trust!
Challenge Focus: What topic does your initiative most directly relate to?
Climate action through awareness and engagement
The Problem: What problem are you helping to solve and who will benefit the most from your solution? How close are you to the problem and/or community impacted?
Adventure playgrounds (APGs) are essential spaces for children to be physically active through free outdoor play, especially in neighbourhoods with limited green space and for children who don’t engage in traditional sports. Lambeth has nine APGs, many in dense social housing and built decades ago. These sites are increasingly affected by climate pressures such as extreme heat, surface flooding and poor drainage. In hot weather or heavy rain, outdoor play becomes unsafe or unusable, directly limiting children’s ability to move, play and stay active. Around one third of children in Lambeth grow up in poverty, and many families live in high-density housing with no gardens. APGs provide vital, local after-school and weekend provision and are often the only nearby place for free outdoor physical activity. As climate impacts intensify, access to outdoor play risks shrinking further, widening existing inequalities in children’s health and wellbeing. We are closely connected to this issue through running Tulse Hill APG- ‘Adventure’ - for over 15 years, supporting 400+ children annually, c.80% living in poverty & 58% with no access to outdoor space. We see daily the benefits of adventure play, and the growing disruption caused by heat, heavy rain and flooding, which has forced multiple closures in the past year. These challenges affect APGs across Lambeth and London.
Your approach: How are you addressing the problem outlined above? How are you using the power of sport and physical activity to build awareness, shift behavior, and enable sustainable participation for all in response to the climate crisis? We'd love to know about the origin of your idea, and what was your "aha" moment" that led you to take action?
“aha” to Action Adventure encompasses 2+ acres of outdoor space & have seen first-hand how climate impacts increasingly restrict safe outdoor play. Our climate action began out of necessity to protect play from changing conditions. Over the past year, we’ve redeveloped the site, combining new play structures with greening & planting, creating ‘Green Adventure’. We learned how nature-based solutions can help playgrounds function better- Increasing tree canopy to provide shade and cooling, hedgerows to slow surface water and reduce flooding, and wider planting to improve drainage. We are now introducing climate awareness, growing & greening activities with children and young people. Small, low-cost changes have made a big difference & hands-on involvement proving to be a powerful way to engage young people in climate action. Through this project we hope to grow this approach & support other APGs to replicate, through: 1.Greening APGs (sustainable participation) Support Lambeth’s adventure playgrounds to increase planting, shade and drainage so children can stay physically active in a wider range of weather. Children & young people will help identify priorities, ensuring changes reflect how spaces are used. 2.Green Adventure Play (climate awareness) Climate awareness will be embedded into everyday play through simple activities and conversations about climate impacts, biodiversity and adaptation. Young people will help design and deliver greening, building ownership & interest in climate action. 3. Piloting & sharing Green Adventure training (shift behaviours) We will pilot practical Green Adventure training for staff & partners, capture learning & share it across Lambeth’s & London’s APG network, leaving skills in place to replicate the approach.
Collaboration with young people and the community: In what ways does your initiative engage young people and community members closest to the problem? What role do they play in building the solution you deliver?
At Adventure & across our work, we support 400+ children & young people annually (+ many more through our partnerships-Building Young Brixton (BYB www.buildingyoungbrixton.com & Lambeth Peer Action Collective (LPAC www.lambethpac.com). Meaningfully involving young people is central to shaping how Adventure is used & cared for & how services are designed and delivered: -Children & young people have already been actively involved in the design and co-build if the new structures and will be hands-on greening, identifying where shade is needed, how spaces should adapt to heat or heavy rain, & how natural features such as planting and wildlife areas can be integrated into play to reflect how children actually move, play & spend time outdoors. -Older young people are supported through our Building Young Leaders programmes to take on leadership roles, planning a& leading climate awareness activities for younger children & supporting greening work on site. -Our Youth Council is actively involved in shaping programmes & participatory budgeting, helping decide priorities & how resources are used. For this project, young people will co-design and co-facilitate the training increasing ownership, confidence and awareness of climate issues. -The wider community is involved through families, local residents & playground staff supporting planting days and ongoing care. This approach is informed by research from LPAC- highlighting the importance of trusted adults & consistent, welcoming spaces. APGs already provide these conditions, enabling meaningful participation and shared decision-making. Through LPAC, young people will also have opportunities to take their learning further, contributing to wider social action, research & policy work on climate, play & inequality.
Potential for/Evidence of Impact: How do you imagine your initiative will make a difference in raising climate awareness, shifting behaviors, or reducing environmental impact or harm? If you have already implemented it, what difference have you made so far? What is the impact your initiative has had¡, and/or what impact do you envision having in the future?
We expect this project to create impact across 3 areas: 1.Raising climate awareness (short/medium term) Green Adventures builds on learning already tested through our services, showing climate awareness is most effective when embedded into everyday activity. At Adventure, 100+ children have already engaging in site & greening redesign. Awareness will develop through experiencing change in real-time: noticing cooler areas under trees, improved drainage after rain how planting changes the space over time. Outcomes -Increased connection to nature & outdoor play -Climate awareness embedded into daily provision -Young people witnessing climate adaptation in real time 2.Shifting behaviours (medium term) This project builds on our established youth leadership approaches, supporting older young people (aged 15–18) to lead activities & model positive behaviours. Skilling of APGs workforce through training will leave knowledge within organisations. Sharing learning across Lambeth’s APGs has potential to reach 1,000+ children annually. Outcomes -Increased care, responsibility & engagement in climate action -Increased skills & knowledge of the issue at workforce level -Open-access training resources created & shared 3.Reducing environmental impact and building resilience (longer term) Early greening & drainage improvements at Adventure have been created. As planting matures benefits will increase over time. Scaling this low-cost approach across Lambeth’s APGs could benefit 1000s children over the next 3–5 years, embedding climate-resilient play spaces and long-term behaviour change. Outcomes -Greener, cooler, more resilient play spaces -Fewer weather-related closures and more usable play days -A scalable, low-cost model embedded across APGs
Innovation: What is different about your initiative compared to other solutions that are already out there? How is your approach original and innovative?
Children & families we work with feel disconnected from climate change work, despite being disproportionately affected by weather extremes. Poor air quality, damp and mould in poorly ventilated housing, lack of outdoor space and overcrowding are all conditions intensified by heatwaves and cold weather. Climate change is already part of daily life, but rarely addressed in ways that feel relevant or accessible. APGs are often overlooked and misunderstood in relation to their role in physical wellbeing and their potential to connect children to climate action. We aim to address this by putting APGs at the centre of innovative, local, community-led responses to real and felt climate impacts. The innovation lies in combining physical activity, climate adaptation, youth leadership and skills-building within everyday adventure play, rather than treating climate action as a separate or educational add-on. Our approach positions young people not just as participants, but as designers and leaders of climate action, with adventure playgrounds as the conduit. Children and young people identify where changes are needed, help design adaptations and lead greening activity. Climate learning happens through engagement in play, shifting behaviour by making care for the environment part of daily routine, while leaving APGs with practical skills and solutions to respond to ongoing challenges in their outdoor spaces. By training staff, developing open-access resources and working across Lambeth’s network of adventure playgrounds, we create a low-cost, replicable model that can be sustained and scaled, reframing APGs as leaders in climate-related , community-led sports spaces that support health, equity and long-term engagement and behaviour change in climate related issues.
Roles and Responsibilities: Describe how responsibilities are shared among your team or partners.
---Overall lead: High Trees--- High Trees is responsible for overall project leadership, coordination and delivery. Based in Lambeth for over 30 years, we bring experience in frontline service delivery alongside systems change, partnership working and influencing in the borough and beyond. We will manage budgets, timelines, learning and reporting, and ensure the project delivers sustainable, practical impact. As Lambeth’s VCS infrastructure support organisation, we will also embed learning into existing networks and training programmes to maximise reach and value, share and promote learning, ensuring resources and findings are openly accessible across networks and websites. ---Children, Young People & Families Team (High Trees)--- Our CYPF Team of 6 will lead on delivery within adventure playgrounds, drawing on expertise in adventure play, forest school approaches and growing. They will facilitate day-to-day engagement with children and families, embed climate awareness into play sessions, and support young people to co-design and deliver greening activity. ---Community Action Team (High Trees)--- The Community Action Team, including the Youth & Social Action Coordinator, will support older young people through the Young Leaders programme. They will enable young people to take on leadership and facilitation roles within the project and support progression and skills development. ---Education & Training Team (High Trees)--- This team will help design Green Adventures training for adventure playground staff and partners, and supporting delivery by young people and CYPF staff . They will develop practical, accessible training content and open-access resources to ensure learning is sustained and replicated across sites. ---Delivery partners: Community Gardeners, Eco-landscapers, Lambeth Parks Teams--- Local, experienced gardeners will work alongside staff and young people to deliver playful, practical and purposeful approaches to using nature and planting to combat climate change. They will bring specialist knowledge of green infrastructure, planting and climate adaptation, supporting low-cost, nature-based solutions tailored to each site. ---Adventure playground partners: Lambeth Adventure Playgrounds--- Adventure playgrounds across Lambeth, including two sites already part of the Building Young Brixton partnership (www.buildingyoungbrixton.com), will host pilot activity, test approaches and take part in shared learning and training and are key to scaling the model. ----Social Action Partner: Lambeth Peer Action Collective (LPAC)---- LPAC (www.lambethpac.com) is a youth-led peer research and social action partnership- members will contribute insight, inspiration and peer leadership to emerging Green Young Leaders, showing how local climate action can connect to wider collective action, research and policy influence for those who want to progress further.
Viability and Scalability: How are you setting your organization up for success, and what is your plan to ensure operational sustainability of your solution and its impact? What are your ideas for scaling your initiative to the next level?
Green Adventures is designed to be operationally sustainable by embedding climate adaptation & awareness into existing services, staff roles & daily practice, rather than relying on time-limited or specialist delivery. High Trees brings extensive experience in delivering and sustaining place-based programmes, alongside our role as Lambeth’s VCS infrastructure support organisation. Viability is strengthened using low-cost, nature-based solutions that improve over time, with minimal ongoing maintenance. Training APG staff and developing open-access resources ensures skills remain within organisations, reducing dependency on external support. Learning is embedded into existing training, youth leadership & community action programmes, adding value rather than creating parallel systems. Scalability is built into the model from the outset- We are piloting & refining the approach at Adventure, then sharing learning across Lambeth’s APGs through training, peer learning & shared resources. This enables a cost-effective spread across multiple sites serving thousands of children annually. To scale further, we will extend learning into other boroughs via London VCS Infastructure offers (members of London Plus). Our infrastructure role and existing networks place us well to coordinate this growth, while maintaining a localised community-led, youth-centred approach.
Upcoming Milestones: Please provide an overview of the milestones that are required for your initiative to come to fruition/ to grow.
---Phase 1: Set-up and co-design (Months 1–4)--- +Reconfirm delivery partners, roles and governance +Establish working project group of key partners and stakeholders +Establish baseline measures (participation, site usability, weather-related closures, youth engagement) +Engage children and young people through play sessions, youth leadership and the Youth Council to map climate challenges (heat, flooding, shade, usability) across Adventure and one of the APG site +Co-design site-specific, low-cost climate adaptations with staff and local gardeners ---Phase 2: Implementation and testing (Months 5–12)--- +Deliver greening and climate adaptations at Tulse Hill Adventure Playground and pilot sites +Embed climate awareness and care into everyday play and youth leadership activity +Support older young people to lead delivery and mentor younger children +Deliver initial staff training and peer learning across Lambeth adventure playgrounds ---Phase 3: Refinement and expansion (Months 13–16)--- +Refine delivery based on seasonal learning and user feedback +Extend training and peer learning to additional Lambeth adventure playgrounds +Begin formal evaluation, capturing qualitative and quantitative data on use, behaviour and resilience ---Phase 4: Funded evaluation and dissemination (Months 17–18)--- +Complete full funded-period evaluation against outcomes and baselines +Produce learning reports, case studies and open-access resources +Share findings through networks, training and community research platforms ---Phase 5: Post-funding impact and long-term monitoring (Months 19–30 – funded by High Trees)--- +Continue monitoring impact as planting matures and behaviour change embeds +Track longer-term changes in site usability, participation and resilience +Embed learning into High Trees’ ongoing training, youth leadership and schools-linked programmes +Share longer-term findings with funders, partners and policymakers
Capacity-Building Participation and Support Funding: If you were to make it as a finalist, you will be required to participate in an 8-week capacity building programme. If funding/ cost is a barrier to your participation, we may be able to offer up to 10,000 GBP of grant money available to support you. Please break down below, if it is the case, what costs you would incur and you would need covered. (Please note that there are restrictions on how the grant money may be used; please refer to the T&Cs for further details (LINK).
Capacity building and participation funding support would be used to ensure meaningful participation in both the capacity building support, partnership and project development and bid refinement without reducing frontline delivery or excluding smaller partners. Specifically funding will be used for: - Backfilling staff time for senior and delivery staff at High Trees to participate fully in sessions, mentoring, preparation and follow-up work and ensuring continued delivery of adventure play, youth leadership and community programmes during the 8-week period -Participation costs for smaller adventure playground partners to contribute to the partnership and project development, enabling partners to attend sessions and contribute learning -Facilitating workshops with young people, families and community members in project design, with recognition vouchers for their time Without this support, participation would either reduce direct service delivery or limit partner involvement.
