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Team Sussex at the Brighton Marathon

Dr Ellen Rotheray and students Hannah Ferguson and Natasha Chand with a bee hotel on campus

Sussex has an ambition to be the most biodiverse campus in the UK. Nestled in the South Downs National Park, the University has a unique opportunity to embrace and enhance the biodiversity that surrounds our campus.

In April 2022, Team Sussex, made up of alumni, staff and students, ran and cycled the Brighton Marathon, generating over £7,000 in sponsorship. In collaboration with the Sussex Fund, the money raised has been used to fund five staff- and student-led biodiversity projects on campus.

The projects, including a six-tree heritage orchard, have used their funding in a range of ways from birdboxes and bee hotels, to producing resources for outreach and public engagement.

One project that received funding was the Psychology School Garden project, which was led by Dr Charlotte Rae and installed planters of drought-tolerant perennials and a ‘pocket allotment’ in the Pevensey courtyard, enhancing the space for students, staff and nature.

Charlotte said:

“We run regular gardening sessions as a wellbeing activity, and to raise awareness of the importance of the natural world and role of pollinators in food provision. There are benches integrated within the planters, so that students, staff and visitors can also use this space for meetings and lunch breaks.”

Collaboration between staff and students is a common theme of the projects, and several have provided space for teaching and research, as well as improving the beauty of the Sussex campus.

The Pollinators projects established 24 solitary bee nest boxes across 12 sites on campus. Led by Dr Ellen Rotheray and Prof Dave Goulson, two Masters students Hannah Ferguson and Natasha Chand, monitored the boxes for their research to document their use and related their success to the abundance of flowering plants nearby.

Highlighting the project’s valuable findings, Ellen says:

“The students discovered that more flowering plants led to quicker, more frequent foraging bouts, which means that bees were able to collect more pollen in less time to complete nests. These results not only evidence that there is a deficit of nesting sites on campus but illustrate how important local flowering plants are for the success of solitary bees.”

Marathon sponsorship also helped buy signage to spotlight the biodiversity of our campus for the local community. The Love Your Scrub project built on this by installing four seasonal story boards, created by local artist Daniel Locke.

Love Your Scrub, led by Dr Chris Sandom, Sussex student Stephen Woodcock, and Rewilding Sussex, reclaimed a 2-hectare area of land on the west slope of campus. The area will ultimately become scrub land, which can be an unloved habitat that some people consider ‘untidy’, however the story boards show the natural benefits that scrub will bring to the campus.

Chris says:

“Art is an amazing way to think and learn about the landscape and nature around us, both the nature here now but also what it could be in the future.”

Sussex is grateful to have such a generous community of alumni, staff, students and corporate partners who, like Team Sussex, support the Sussex Fund. If you would like to hear more about giving to Sussex or would like to discuss making a donation, please email us at giving@sussex.ac.uk or .

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