The Big Community Challenge

The Big Community Challenge is an annual volunteering project, coordinated by York Cares.

Organised in partnership with the City of York Council’s ECO Team and the Councillors for Environment and Climate Emergency, St. Nicks and the University of York, the Big Community Challenge brings employers together over a month to make a transformational change in urban green spaces across the city. It is an opportunity to come together, to be part of something big in the city and to make a real difference to our local environment.

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Sustainability at York

Big Community Challenge 2024

The Big Community Challenge (BCC) 2024 focused on changing landscapes through social and environmental connections; connecting communities with nature through practical and creative opportunities.

The BCC identified sites in the North, South, East and West of York, linking to St Nicks’ York Green corridors project. Routes led into the city centre, ending around the city walls and culminating in North Street Gardens as part of a longer-term project funded by Nature Hubs. Teams worked together to select sites across the city which are key to preserving and improving biodiversity in the city. With the help of our volunteers, the 2024 BCC helped change our landscapes for the benefit of the people and wildlife of the city.

Improving biodiversity on campus

This year, a number of key projects took place as part of BCC to preserve and improve the biodiversity of our campus. These activities included the maintenance of the mini-forest on Kimberlow Hill; bulb planting and dead hedging around the wildlife reserve on the south side of the lake on Campus East; tansy planting; and preparing sand martin boxes for next year.

These activities followed on from 2023 projects on our University campus, which saw teams on Campus East planted 500 tansy plants, with the long-term aim of developing a tansy habitat, and planted 500 reeds in the lake to improve biodiversity. Other volunteers removed 4,760 tree spirals on Kimberlow Hill to ensure the continued growth of the trees.

Key information

Key dates 2025

The Big Community Challenge will be taking place again in September 2025. Please check back here for exact dates.

This year's theme

Please check back here for updates.

Get involved

Please check back here for updates on how to get involved in BCC 2025.

Big Community Challenge Report 2023

Find out more about last year’s Big Community Challenge and its impact on the community.

About York Cares

Visit the York Cares website to learn more about their programmes and how you can get involved.

How to get involved

The Big Community Challenge runs annually and will return in September 2025 for a month-long calendar of volunteering activities across York. Keep an eye out on this page for opportunities to volunteer with your staff or student team this coming September.

You can also visit York Cares to find out how to take part in volunteering activities with your team throughout the year.

York Cares

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Sustainability at York