Our Energy Cafés give schools an opportunity to offer families friendly, practical advice about keeping warm, managing energy costs and finding extra support this winter.

The sessions bring together energy-saving advice, useful freebies and fun activities for children. They can be run as part of an existing school event or as a standalone session.

What an Energy Café can offer your school

An Energy Café is a simple way to support families in your school community. With help from the Centre for Sustainable Energy (CSE), it’s a chance to bring families together, create conversations and help parents and carers access support in a familiar setting.

Our team takes care of delivering the session, so there’s little extra work for school staff. The events are no cost at all to the school and all we need from you is a space and some support promoting the event to your families.

Energy Cafés usually last a couple of hours and are available throughout the 2026-27 academic year.

By hosting a session, your school can:

• Reach more families and help them access needed support.
• Support your community with practical advice on energy and saving money.
• Bring your school community together with a fun, educational event.

Hosting a session with us can help families find simple ways to keep their homes warm while using less energy and for less cost. Parents and carers can also find out about additional support available to them and take home useful energy saving items.

What happens at an Energy Café?

Our friendly team creates a welcoming space where parents and carers can drop in, ask questions and get advice on managing their energy use.

Energy Café’s can be delivered as part of a larger school event, such as a Christmas fair, or as a standalone session during school pick-up time.

Families may also be able to take home practical energy-saving items, including:

• Draught excluders to help keep cold air out.
• LED light bulbs to use less electricity.
• Energy monitors to track electricity use.
• Larger items, such as heated blankets and slow cookers.

Energy saving fun for the whole family

While parents and carers speak to our team, children can take part in fun activities that introduce them to energy and staying warm.

Activities may include giant snakes and ladders and making their own draught-excluder snakes. These hands-on activities help children discover simple ways to save energy at home while learning through play.

If your school would like to continue these conversations in the classroom, you can also access our free, adaptable educational resources on climate change and energy.

Suitable for Early Years through to Key Stage 2, the resources cover topics including:

• What is climate change?
• How can we save energy?
• What is fuel poverty?

Why is this support important?

In 2025, around one in ten families with children were spending a high proportion of their income to keep their home warm. For single-parent families, that figure rose to almost one in five.

With energy costs putting pressure on people’s budgets, many families face difficult choices about keeping their homes warm and managing other essential costs.

Originally delivered during the 2022 energy crisis, we’re bringing our Energy Cafés back to local schools this winter to help families access practical advice and find out what support is available.