2026 Shade Competition: Winners announcement!

SunSmart’s Win $10,000 for Shade Competition – winners announcement!

The Win $10,000 for Shade Competition has come to a close for 2026. This year, SunSmart wanted to engage with WA high schools as a way to support sun protection in this sector.

The purpose of this competition was to help schools, no matter where they were starting from, to improve their sun safety protection policies and practices for their students, staff and school community. We hope this competition has helped to demonstrate some of the small changes that can be made, working towards long term improvements in minimising the over exposure to harmful UV radiation.

Some of the initiatives implemented by schools included:

• Long-sleeved clothing options for staff and students
• UV protective arm sleeves encouraged for HPE and outdoor education staff
• Removing baseball caps from the uniform shop and promoting sun protective hats
• Providing all new students with a sun protective hat
• Students designing sun safe hats and clothing options for the school
• Student leaders promoting sun safe changes throughout the school
• Improving sunscreen accessibility
• Adding the UV index widget to the school webpage
• Using school newsletters and social media to broadcast sun safety reminders
• Conducting shade audits around the school campus to assist with shade planning
• Planning sun safe outdoor events and rescheduling events to be held outside of peak UV times, such as twilight carnivals

We were so pleased to see a range of schools across WA improving their current sun safety practices and becoming eligible to enter the competition. We had a variety of schools enter, including from within the Perth metropolitan area, to district high schools, remote community schools and more!

We challenge all schools to keep pushing for these positive changes and to lead the way in sun safety initiatives.

Now for the exciting news!

A massive congratulations to the winning school – Bridgetown High School. They will be receiving $10,000 to contribute to a shade project in their school.

The two runner-up schools each receiving a 3×3 metre SunSmart marquee are Salvado Catholic College (Byford) and Leaning Tree Steiner School (Geraldton).

The following five schools will receive a SunSmart Prize Pack:

• Beehive Montessori School (Mosman Park)
• Broome Senior High School
• Menzies Community School
• Warwick Senior High School
• Seton Catholic College (Samson)

Congratulations to all schools for entering the 2026 Shade Competition and for improving their school’s sun safety practices.

If you have any questions or would like more support for your school, please email: sunsmart@cancerwa.asn.au or check out the resources on generationsunsmart.com.au