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
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
Heat Safe Summer Sport
Lead Organization Name
London Borough of Lambeth – Libraries and Archives Service
My initiative is designed for and delivered in London
1
Year that you started/ registered your organisation
1965
Website URL(s) or Social Media Handles
https://www.lambeth.gov.uk/libraries
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
HeatSafe Summer Sport is a youth-led climate resilience initiative that uses libraries, schools and leisure centres as trusted hubs to help young people stay active, safe and connected during extreme heat.
Challenge Focus: What topic does your initiative most directly relate to?
Enabling climate-resilient participation
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?
Extreme heat is becoming more frequent and intense in London, creating risks to young people's health, wellbeing and ability to stay active. While much attention focuses on older adults and very young children, young people aged 10–14 are often overlooked despite participating in sport and outdoor activities during hot weather, sometimes without understanding the risks of dehydration, overheating and poor air quality. In West Norwood and across Lambeth, many young people rely on schools, libraries, leisure centres and community spaces for recreation and support. However, these services are often planned separately and are not consistently designed to help young people remain active and safe during periods of extreme heat. The impact extends beyond physical activity, affecting family wellbeing, access to community spaces and resilience during heatwaves. Through engagement with over 70 young people, alongside schools, youth groups, libraries, Active Lambeth and partners, we have identified a need for a more joined-up, climate-adaptive approach. During the development phase, HeatSafe Summer Sport is working with young people, schools, libraries, leisure centres and health partners to co-design activities, safe spaces and heat-aware messaging that can inform future delivery. The initiative is rooted in work with local young people, ensuring their experiences shape the model.
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?
HeatSafe Summer Sport uses sport and physical activity as a practical tool for climate adaptation. The initiative emerged from youth wellbeing work in Lambeth libraries and schools, where young people repeatedly raised concerns about staying cool, safe and active during hot weather. The “aha” moment came from recognising that climate resilience for young people must be built into everyday community activities, not treated as a separate issue. During the 2026 development phase, young people are helping co-design activities, messaging and delivery through schools, youth groups, libraries and community partners. The project is testing how schools, libraries, leisure centres and health partners can work together to provide safe, trusted and climate-adaptive spaces for young people during periods of extreme heat. Through pilot activities and co-design workshops, we are exploring approaches such as hydration routines, rest breaks, indoor and shaded spaces, flexible timings and climate-aware coaching. Libraries are being tested as trusted community hubs, providing cool and accessible spaces for movement, play and social connection. The learning gathered during the development phase will inform wider programme delivery from 2027 onwards. By embedding climate awareness into sport and community activity, and working through trusted messengers and community touch points, the initiative aims to support behaviour change, strengthen resilience and help young people remain active, connected and safe as temperatures continue to rise.
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?
Young people are central to the design, testing and ongoing development of HeatSafe Summer Sport. The initiative is rooted in youth co-design through schools, Youth Wellbeing Committees, community surveys and pilot workshops. More than 80 young people aged 10–14 have already contributed insight on staying safe, active and connected during periods of extreme heat, directly shaping programme priorities. Young people help influence: • Activity types and formats • Preferred settings, including schools, libraries and leisure centres • Heat-safe messaging and communication channels • Evaluation questions and feedback methods During the development phase, we are working with young people from Dunraven, Elmgreen and Grove Adventure Playground through co-design and pilot testing sessions, helping us understand what activities, spaces and support they find most engaging, accessible and effective during hot weather. Young people are not only helping identify challenges but are actively shaping activities, communication approaches, trusted community locations and the criteria we will use to measure success. We are also exploring opportunities for young people to act as peer researchers and HeatSafe ambassadors, helping gather insight from their peers and influence future programme development. The wider community is engaged through libraries, schools, Active Lambeth, health partners, youth organisations and community groups. Rather than delivering a programme for young people, we are building it with them, ensuring lived experience, local knowledge and community assets shape the solution from the outset. This shared ownership approach builds trust, relevance and long-term community capacity to adapt to climate change.
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?
The initiative has already demonstrated strong early impact through youth engagement, co-design and pilot testing. More than 80 young people have contributed insight through surveys, focus groups, Youth Wellbeing Committees and community workshops, helping identify preferred activities, trusted spaces, communication channels and behaviours that support safe participation during periods of extreme heat. Early findings show young people value cool indoor spaces, hydration, trusted adults, flexible activity options and community locations such as libraries and leisure centres. These insights are shaping activity design, heat-safe messaging, evaluation measures and future delivery plans. The development phase is also strengthening partnerships between young people, schools, libraries, Active Lambeth, health partners and community organisations, creating the foundations for future delivery. In the longer term, HeatSafe Summer Sport aims to create a replicable model for climate-resilient youth activity, helping schools, libraries, leisure providers and health partners adapt their programmes and spaces to a changing climate. Success will be measured through participation, behaviour change, partner engagement and the adoption of heat-safe practices across community settings. By strengthening collaboration between young people, community organisations and public services, the initiative seeks to create lasting changes in how communities support youth wellbeing and physical activity during extreme weather. Key behaviour changes include hydration, heat awareness, use of cool community spaces and confidence in adapting activity during hot weather.
Innovation: What is different about your initiative compared to other solutions that are already out there? How is your approach original and innovative?
HeatSafe Summer Sport is innovative because it moves beyond traditional sport delivery and treats physical activity as a tool for climate adaptation, resilience and wellbeing. Most summer sport programmes focus on participation, while most heat-health activity focuses on advice or emergency response. HeatSafe brings these together by exploring how everyday activities, spaces and services can adapt to a changing climate. Key innovations include: • Youth co-design and pilot testing • Libraries used as climate-resilient community hubs • Climate-aware sport and activity models • Integration of health, leisure, education and community sectors • Youth-informed heat-safe messaging and behaviour change • Testing a whole-system approach across schools, libraries, leisure centres and community organisations The innovation is not a single activity, but the way different sectors are brought together around a shared challenge. The project explores how trusted community spaces can support young people to stay active, safe and connected during periods of extreme heat. By focusing on prevention, adaptation and community resilience, HeatSafe Summer Sport seeks to shift how organisations plan summer activities, how young people think about heat risk, and how communities respond to the growing impacts of climate change. The model is designed to be transferable and scalable across other urban communities facing similar challenges.
Roles and Responsibilities: Describe how responsibilities are shared among your team or partners.
Lambeth Libraries is the lead applicant and will provide overall programme leadership, coordination and partnership management. Libraries will lead community engagement, youth co-design, safeguarding oversight, use of library spaces as trusted climate-resilient community hubs, reporting, learning dissemination and alignment with wider Children and Young People wellbeing priorities. Active Lambeth is a core delivery partner, supporting co-design workshops, pilot testing and activity planning. They will contribute leisure expertise, facilities, operational support, coaching insight and practical knowledge of climate-adaptive sport and physical activity delivery. Lambeth’s Climate Change and Sustainability Team will provide strategic input on climate resilience, heat-risk adaptation and systems change. They will help align the initiative with borough climate priorities and connect the project with relevant climate partners and networks. Public Health / HDRC (HEART) and Academic Research Partners will support the monitoring, evaluation and learning framework, including the logic model, questionnaire design, outcome measures, behaviour-change indicators, evidence gathering and future scaling. NHS and Primary Care Network partners, including HBD PCN, will provide health insight, trusted messaging and practitioner perspectives to support heat-health awareness, family engagement and alignment with local Children and Young People priorities. Schools and youth partners, including Dunraven, Elmgreen and Grove Adventure Playground, are supporting youth engagement, co-design and pilot testing. Young people help shape activity choices, preferred settings, heat-safe messaging, communication methods and programme priorities through surveys, workshops and Youth Wellbeing Committees. Community and voluntary sector partners will contribute local knowledge, trusted relationships and community insight, helping ensure the model reflects local needs and is accessible to young people and families. The initiative is built around shared ownership, with young people, community organisations and public services working together to design, test and refine a climate-resilient model for future delivery and scaling from 2027 onwards.
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?
The initiative is being built on existing community infrastructure, trusted partnerships and established delivery systems, helping ensure long-term viability. Libraries, leisure centres, schools and community organisations already act as local anchors, while Active Lambeth provides sport and physical activity expertise. The 2026 development phase is focused on building the evidence base, strengthening partnerships, testing activities and refining a scalable delivery model. We are working with schools, youth organisations, climate and health partners to ensure the model reflects local needs and can be embedded within existing services before wider expansion. Sustainability will be supported through alignment with Lambeth’s Children and Young People, climate resilience, public health and summer activity priorities. The model is designed to complement existing provision rather than create a standalone programme. Future growth could include: • Expansion to additional libraries, leisure centres and community hubs • Development of a HeatSafe toolkit and resources • Training young people and practitioners as HeatSafe ambassadors • Sharing learning with other boroughs and partners facing similar climate challenges The long-term ambition is to embed a transferable model that helps communities adapt youth activity and wellbeing provision as temperatures rise.
Upcoming Milestones: Please provide an overview of the milestones that are required for your initiative to come to fruition/ to grow.
Spring–Summer 2026: Complete youth engagement, co-design workshops and pilot testing through schools, libraries, leisure centres and community partners. Gather and analyse insight on activities, trusted spaces, heat-safe behaviours and communication approaches. Strengthen partnerships with Active Lambeth, schools, climate, health and community partners. Summer–Autumn 2026: Refine the HeatSafe model using learning from youth engagement and pilot activity. Develop the evaluation framework, partnership roles, delivery approach and HeatSafe toolkit. Identify future funding and scaling opportunities. Winter 2026–Spring 2027: Finalise programme design, delivery plans, staff training, safeguarding arrangements and monitoring processes. Confirm venues, partners, referral routes and engagement pathways. Summer 2027: Launch and deliver the HeatSafe Summer Sport programme across community, library and leisure settings, supported by ongoing monitoring, evaluation and youth feedback. Autumn 2027: Review impact, share learning and explore wider adoption across Lambeth and other communities facing similar climate challenges.
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).
The development funding will support the 2026 refinement and testing phase of HeatSafe Summer Sport, enabling us to apply learning from the capacity-building programme and strengthen the model ahead of future delivery. Indicative use of the £10,000 development funding: • Project initiation, onboarding, planning and partnership coordination – £3,000 • Youth co-design, engagement activity and light-touch pilot testing with schools, libraries, leisure centres and community partners – £4,000 • Finalisation of the delivery model, monitoring and evaluation framework, development summary report and future implementation plan – £3,000 This investment will enable us to test ideas, strengthen partnerships, gather evidence and refine a scalable climate-resilient model for future delivery and growth from 2027 onwards
Now that you've explored what it truly means to put young people at the centre, how are you designing your initiative so that young people are genuine co-leaders and co-creators of the initiative?
Young people are at the centre of HeatSafe Summer Sport as co-creators of the model, not simply participants in activities. We are starting from a place of strong youth consultation and co-design, and using the development phase to move towards greater shared ownership. We began with an adult-led proposal, but the development process has shown that young people have strong, practical ideas that make the model more relevant, credible and likely to succeed. Through Youth Wellbeing Committees, school partnerships, surveys, focus groups and community workshops, young people are helping define the problems we focus on, identify barriers to participation during extreme heat, and shape the activities, environments, messaging and success measures that guide the initiative. This has already influenced the design. Insight from the Dunraven survey, Dunraven focus group and Grove Adventure Playground workshop has shown that young people want cool indoor spaces, hydration and rest breaks, trusted adults, flexible activity options, water-based activity, leisure centre access, library-based spaces and youth-friendly communication. These findings are directly shaping our delivery settings, activity choices, heat-safe behaviours, evaluation methods and future priorities. The practical shift for our team is that young people are not only being asked for feedback after decisions are made. They are helping shape what is tested, what questions we ask, what success looks like and how learning is shared. We are also developing opportunities for young people to act as peer researchers, ambassadors and co-facilitators, gathering insight from their peers and helping communicate findings to partners. Our long-term ambition is that young people help shape not only activities, but also how schools, libraries, leisure services and community organisations respond to extreme heat. By embedding youth voice throughout design, testing, evaluation and future scale-up, HeatSafe Summer Sport aims to create a model designed with young people, informed by lived experience and accountable to the communities it serves.
What partnerships and collaborations are most critical to delivering and sustaining your initiative and how are you building/ plan to build them?
HeatSafe Summer Sport depends on cross-sector collaboration because no single organisation can address the connected challenges of extreme heat, youth wellbeing and physical activity alone. The most critical partnerships are with young people, schools, libraries, Active Lambeth, health and research partners, climate specialists and community organisations. Young people are central co-creators, helping shape priorities, activities, messaging, evaluation and future delivery. Schools and youth organisations provide trusted access to young people and support co-design and testing. Lambeth Libraries provide coordination and trusted community spaces that can act as climate-resilient hubs. Active Lambeth contributes sport, leisure and operational expertise, including insight into safe and adaptable activity delivery. Climate Change and Sustainability colleagues help align the initiative with wider climate adaptation priorities and systems-change thinking. Public Health, HDRC/HEART, academic research partners and NHS/Primary Care partners support behaviour-change insight, heat-health messaging, evaluation and evidence gathering. Community and voluntary sector partners, including Grove Adventure Playground, bring local knowledge, trusted relationships and access to young people and families. We are also exploring how community organisations, local businesses, sports bodies and local networks such as the Business Improvement District can extend reach and legitimacy. These partners can help reach young people and families who may not normally engage with council services, support trusted communication routes, and provide insight into local needs, behaviours and community touch points. During the 2026 development phase, we are building these partnerships through co-design workshops, focus groups, pilot testing, stakeholder meetings and shared learning. The Dunraven focus group and Grove Adventure Playground workshop have already helped test assumptions, strengthen community insight and shape the programme model. The partnership approach is structured around a common goal: enabling young people to remain active, safe and connected during extreme heat. By working through trusted local spaces and trusted messengers such as teachers, sports coaches, health professionals and community leaders, the initiative can reach young people and families in ways that feel relevant, credible and practical. Our long-term ambition is to create a coordinated partnership network that embeds heat-safe approaches within existing community services and supports wider adoption across Lambeth and beyond.
What are you measuring, how are you measuring it, and what does the data tell you so far (quantitative and qualitative)?
During the 2026 development phase, we are measuring three dimensions of change: reach and engagement, changes in awareness, and changes in behaviour, alongside early systems-change indicators. This includes the number of young people engaged, participation levels, preferred activities and settings, heat-health awareness, confidence to stay active safely during hot weather, and behaviour changes such as hydration, use of cool spaces, rest breaks and adapting activity during extreme heat. We are collecting data through surveys, focus groups, co-design workshops, pilot sessions, attendance records, observation, facilitator notes and participant feedback. We are also gathering qualitative insight from young people, schools, Active Lambeth, libraries, health partners and community organisations to understand barriers, opportunities and what needs to change in the wider system. So far, more than 80 young people have contributed through surveys, Youth Wellbeing Committees, school engagement, the Dunraven focus group and the Grove Adventure Playground workshop. Quantitative data has helped identify activity preferences, trusted settings, communication channels and heat-safe needs. Qualitative feedback shows that young people value cool indoor spaces, hydration, trusted adults, flexible activities, leisure centre access, library-based spaces and youth-friendly communication. We are also measuring early signs of systems change, including new partnerships forming, partners adapting the model, young people influencing design, and schools, libraries, leisure services, health partners and climate colleagues working more closely around a shared goal. This approach allows us to measure both impact and learning. It helps us prove what is changing, improve the model as we test it, and understand whether HeatSafe Summer Sport is moving towards its wider goal of embedding heat-safe youth activity across community settings.
Long-term impact: what lasting systems change are you seeking to create and how will you know when it has happened?
The long-term systems change we are seeking is a shift from fragmented services to a coordinated, climate-responsive system that supports young people to stay active, healthy and safe during periods of extreme heat. At present, schools, leisure providers, libraries, health services and community organisations often operate separately, with heat-health guidance and climate resilience not consistently embedded within youth activity provision. HeatSafe Summer Sport aims to connect these sectors around a shared goal: enabling young people to participate safely in sport, play and community life as temperatures rise. A key part of this vision is establishing libraries as trusted climate-resilience hubs, providing accessible community spaces where information, support, activities and trusted messaging can be shared across generations. The focus group and Grove Adventure Playground workshop reinforced that young people value cool indoor spaces, trusted adults, flexible activity options, hydration, rest breaks and youth-friendly communication. These insights are helping shape a model that is practical, locally trusted and rooted in lived experience. Success in five to ten years would mean that climate-adaptive approaches are embedded within existing services, not treated as a one-off project. We would expect to see schools, libraries, leisure services, health partners and community organisations routinely planning together for extreme heat, using shared heat-safe guidance, adapting summer activities, and involving young people in design and evaluation. We will know the change has happened when heat-safe practices, trusted community messaging, youth co-design and coordinated responses to extreme weather become part of everyday service delivery. We will also know change is happening when partners are activated beyond this project continuing to adapt practice, share learning and work together on heat resilience without needing HeatSafe to drive every action. If HeatSafe Summer Sport disappeared tomorrow, success would mean that the partnerships, behaviours, practices and ways of working it helped create would continue without it. The system itself would have changed.
Is there anything else you'd like to share with us that you were not able to share in previous questions?
One of the most valuable lessons from the development and capacity-building process has been recognising that HeatSafe Summer Sport is not simply about delivering activities during hot weather. It is about strengthening the relationships, community assets and systems that help young people and communities adapt to a changing climate. Through engagement with young people, schools, libraries, Active Lambeth, climate specialists, health partners and community organisations, our thinking has evolved from a programme-based approach towards a wider systems-change model. The Dunraven focus group and Grove Adventure Playground workshop have reinforced that young people want practical, trusted and youth-friendly approaches that help them stay cool, active, safe and connected. We increasingly see libraries as trusted community resilience hubs, connecting information, people, services and opportunities for action. The development phase has also reinforced the importance of youth leadership, intergenerational engagement and trusted community touch points in influencing behaviour change. We believe the challenge presents an opportunity not only to support young people during periods of extreme heat, but also to explore how communities can work together to build long-term resilience, wellbeing and climate adaptation from the ground up. Even during development, the project is already acting as a crystallisation point, bringing partners together around heat, youth wellbeing, sport and community resilience in a way that had not previously happened.
