SAGE Corporate Social Responsibility
In the community
At SAGE we believe in adding value globally, locally, and within our own community. We fully involve our employees in what and how we can do this.
We have the following groups - the Consultative Group who meet monthly with Senior Management to discuss business and staff issues; the Connect Group who are responsible for social and charity initiatives; and the Green Group, who are leading an action plan for us to improve our environmental credentials.
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Read more about our Green initiatives |
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Read more about our Connect Group activities |
Green initiatives at SAGE UK
As a company, SAGE is committed to addressing the impact our daily business activity has on the environment.
Read our green policy statement
The Green Group was first formed in 2006, and has made some key achievements.. These include:
- Being a founding member of the PREPS database which uses the Egmont Grading System to determine the sustainability of different paper suppliers (http://www.prepsgroup.com/what.php).
- Printing our books and journals on FSC papers wherever possible.
- Monitoring air miles and encouraging employees to use other forms of transport where possible.
- Offsetting carbon emissions from business air travel (through Climate Care http://www.jpmorganclimatecare.com/).
- Introducing green company vehicles.
- Re-using and recycling of packaging and other wastes, including establishing a recycling point in our office and recycling old books/journals.
- Requiring potential suppliers to answer questions about their environmental practice as part of the tender process.
Our chief commitments focus on:
- Energy
- Climate change
- Waste
- Communication
- A commitment to improve
Energy
One of the largest amounts of Carbon Dioxide production for SAGE is generated from energy use at our office and warehouse. We actively encourage employees to reduce energy use by turning off lights and equipment, and are also exploring the percentage of energy consumption that can be purchased from renewable sources.
Climate change
The journey of our printed products covers several countries worldwide, with paper being sourced in one location; printers in another; and books and journals being shipped back and forth between the SAGE offices. A major project we are undertaking is to build an accurate picture of all the activities that have a carbon impact, creating a detailed process flow map; calculating the carbon footprint created; and investigating the best options that will most effectively help to reduce our carbon footprint.
Waste
The motto of our Green Group is to reduce, reuse and recycle. We review printed waste from our publishing and marketing activities, and office recycling and waste.
We have already made significant strides in reducing waste in our office. For example this year we introduced plastic drinking glasses in place of disposable cups. It might seem like a small change, but at one point we were using more than 3500 plastic cups a month. By switching to reusable we’re saving significantly on this waste.
We were an early adopter of centralised office recycling and waste bins. None of our employees have an individual waste bin under their desk.
Communication
Our policy and environmental commitments will be reviewed every year. One of our commitments is to ensure that all SAGE employees are aware of our aims, objectives and actions. Our commitments to the environment will also be made available on our website.
Commitment to improve
This is an ongoing action plan, which will involve us monitoring the environmental credentials and performance of our suppliers, and setting targets for improvement. This is in particular for our printers, but also other major suppliers to SAGE, such as our couriers.
If you have questions about SAGE’s environmental action plan, please contact sagegreengroup@sagepub.co.uk for further information.
SAGE’s Commitment to Charity
Download a copy of our Commitment to Charity brochure
Local School Initiative
SAGE is committed to supporting the local community and has formed a close partnership with a local school, St Monica’s Primary School in Hoxton. Our partnership with the school includes making financial contributions, encouraging employee participation in reading and numeracy schemes run by Inspire, the Education Business Partnership for Hackney, and encouraging children to visit the SAGE offices and learn about the world of work.
SAGE Supports Reading at St Monica’s Primary School
Since 2003, SAGE has been involved in the Reading Partners Scheme run through Inspire. Every Wednesday, SAGE volunteers visit St Monica's Primary School in Hoxton and read with pupils in year 3. The scheme gives children an opportunity to read aloud one on one with an adult, and aims to improve their literacy skills and confidence, whilst encouraging a love of reading. The SAGE volunteers also benefit enormously from this experience, and it really puts our work as an educational publisher into context.
SAGE Supports Numeracy at St Monica’s Primary School
As well as supporting reading at St Monica's, SAGE participates in Inspire's Number Partners scheme, which matches volunteers with pupils in year 5 to improve numeracy skills. Every Wednesday, volunteers visit the school and play maths board games, group numeracy games or the children's favourite, Fizz Buzz! Not only does this extra time spent on Maths help to build the pupils’ confidence, it is also rewarding and enjoyable for the volunteers.
Chess Club at St Monica’s
In 2007, SAGE raised money for St Monica's School through a cycle event at Hearn Hill Velodrome. The children who participated in the event had a fantastic time and felt really proud to be involved in something that would benefit their school. The money raised was used to buy equipment to start a Chess Club which has proven to be very successful and has grown in number week on week. Year 5 pupils play against each other on Thursday lunch times, and SAGE volunteers attend to mentor and support them. A passion for chess has developed within the school and outdoor chess tables on the playground are crowded at lunch time as children teach their peers.
SAGE Donates Books for Schools
“Books for Schools” is a charitable scheme set up by SAGE in 2002. Under the scheme, SAGE employees are invited to nominate a school that they would like to receive a donation from SAGE to buy books. Each year, up to 24 schools are chosen to receive donations of £500. In 2009 alone, SAGE donated over £11,000 to schools around the world.
The aims of the books for schools initiative are:
- To donate money for books to schools in need, in the local community, around the UK and abroad.
- To support education and raise awareness of the pleasures of reading and to promote a love of books.
- To provide a link between SAGE employees and schools in their community and around the world.
Since the scheme began in 2002, SAGE has donated money to over 100 schools, including St Monica's School in Hackney, Woodlands High School in Cardiff, Hope Flowers School in Gaza, and the Wa School on the Thai/Burmese border.
Encouraging Learning World Wide
SAGE is strongly committed to the international dissemination of the scholarship we publish. We are particularly concerned to ensure its effective availability beyond the major industrialized nations. As part of that commitment, SAGE sponsors a number of initiatives including:
∙ Research4Life
The UN’s Research4Life initiative, which encompasses the AGORA, HINARI and OARE programmes, enables developing countries to gain access to one of the world's largest collections of research on health, agriculture and the environment. More than 4,500 institutions in 108 developing countries have free or low cost access to over 7,000 journals through these initiatives.
∙ INASP
INASP (International Network for the Availability of Scientific Publications) was established in 1992 by the International Council for Science (ICSU) to improve access to information and knowledge through a commitment to capacity building in emerging and developing countries. INASP provides institutions with access to SAGE Premier (all SAGE journals online). Currently 47 institutions in Ethiopia, Honduras, Malawi, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda are benefiting from SAGE Premier through INASP.
∙ The Journal Donation Project
The Faculty of the New School University in New York launched The Journal Donation Project in 1990. The principal objective of the Project is to assist in rebuilding major research and teaching libraries in countries that have fallen victim to political or economic deprivation through the provision of current subscriptions and back volume sets of English language scholarly, professional and current events journals. It is active in Russia and the FSU countries, Nigeria, Vietnam, Cuba and Indonesia.
∙ Book Aid International
Book Aid International works in 18 countries in sub-Saharan Africa and Palestine, providing over half a million books and journals each year to libraries, hospitals, refugee camps and schools. The majority of Book Aid’s support goes to rural and urban libraries which are free and accessible to everyone. Book Aid International works with library partners to develop their pivotal role in the community.
Fundraisers and Charitable Donations
In addition to the charity and volunteer work SAGE does to support education in the local community and around the world, the SAGE Connect Group also sponsors SAGE employees’ charitable activities and holds fundraisers at the SAGE offices. Over the last five years, the Connect Group have donated over £90,000 to a variety of charitable events and supported nearly 100 different SAGE employees in their individual fundraising efforts. At the end of 2010, SAGE donated a total of £20,000 to charities nominated by SAGE staff. The charities chosen were MSF, Depression Alliance, Make a Wish, NSPCC, Smile Train, Harris Hospice, Crisis at Christmas and Action Aid UK.
Some of the other charities SAGE has donated to in the last five years are:
| Alzheimer’s Society Amnesty International Battersea Dogs & Cats home Breakthrough Breast Cancer British Heart Foundation Cancer Research Courtney’s Appeal Comic Relief Disasters and Emergencies Committee Gaza Crisis Appeal Friends of the Earth Greenpeace Guy’s and St Thomas’ Charity Help the Aged Lennox Children's Hospital Leukaemia Research Medicins Sans Frontières MacMillan Cancer Charity |
Marie Curie No More Landmines North London Cruse Bereavement Care North London Hospice Oxfam Parkview House, London Red Cross Refuge Samaritans Starlight Children Charity Save the Children Shelter The Big Issue The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society The Poppy Project Women’s Aid |
