The brief for 2026 - “How to Create a Sustainability Culture”

For the 2026 Competition, students are invited to submit no more than one (1) entry each exploring the theme of “Creating a Sustainability Culture”.

We are open to accepting any form of student response; you can choose to create a piece of artwork, music, a video, poem, essay, letter, story, etc..  There are no restrictions on the type of work submitted, we want students to be as open and creative in interpreting the theme as possible, however it must meet the submission criteria detailed below.

Accepted file formats: DOC, DOCX,  PDF, JPG, PNG, MP3 or MP4

Maximum file size: 400MB (for any file type)

Word limit: Written entries should be a maximum 600 words (not including the bibliography and optional 150 word maximum self-reflection)

Duration limit: Video or audio pieces should be a maximum of 3 minutes long

To help us ensure an anonymised judging process, please ensure that the student’s name and school name are not included in the uploaded files, these should only be included where specified on the entry form.

If the entry is a non-written piece, it needs to be accompanied by a short explanation of the piece (maximum 200 words). This can be added at the end of the entry, or uploaded as a separate file.

As an optional extra, entries may include a maximum 150-word self-reflection on the project by the student. This is an open reflection but could include, for example, what they have learnt by participating, any skills they have developed, what their ‘take away’ from the project is, what they have enjoyed or found challenging, or any actions they have been inspired to take as a result. This can be added to the end of the entry or uploaded as a separate document.

Teachers can register on the TSL Submittable page from September 7th 2025 until March 1st 2026.

Judging:

The judges look for originality and creativity in all formats – and the potential to contribute to constructive national or international debate. Unique perspectives score highly.

Our judges will be scoring entries on:

• Understanding of the topic
• Originality, innovation and creativity
• Inspirational power
• Communication and presentation of idea (effective use of chosen medium)

All work should be original and the student’s own. A bibliography of references should be included where appropriate and will not be counted as part of the official word limit. Entries with plagiarised content will not be considered for an award.

If students choose to use AI to support them in their research, then it is important they do not use AI tools to generate a final entry and submit it as if it was their own work. The use of generative AI must be acknowledged in the bibliography (as detailed below) where it has been used as a functional tool to assist in the process of creating entries.

Minimum requirement to include in bibliography:

• Name and version of the generative AI system used; e.g. ChatGPT-3.5
• Publisher (company that made the AI system); e.g. OpenAI
• URL of the AI system.
• Brief description (single sentence) of context in which the tool was used.
• The prompt(s) used to generate a response in the AI system.

For example: “I acknowledge the use of ChatGPT 3.5 (Open AI, https://chat.openai.com) to summarise my initial notes and to proofread my final draft.”