January Newsletter: Sharing Gratitude & Excitement for 2024!
Happy New Year! We hope you had a memorable holiday season and a positive start to 2024. At Be the Change, we are energized and excited for the year ahead!
This week, September 20 - 27, millions will walk from their homes and places of work to join young climate strikers as they demand urgent action on the most pressing issue of their time: the climate emergency.
Many educators support these walkouts, with some institutions going as far as cancelling classes the day of, and with many teachers committing to a ‘no major assignments pledge.’ Locally, UBC has endorsed the strike and the BCTF has come out in support.
And yet, in the absence of class attendance, this seems to be the ultimate teaching moment. We can learn so much from this youth-led demonstration of power, solidarity, diversity, and determination -- and if past climate strikes serve as any indication, we can witness some real beauty in the process. In the words of Greta Thunberg, “If you still say that we are wasting valuable lesson time, then let me remind you that our political leaders have wasted decades through denial and inaction.”
I personally participated in some of the major climate protests and student walkouts in London this year, and the energy was second-to-none. It was incredible to stand witness as thousands of students from varying grade levels and post-secondary institutions systematically organized. Even more surprising was that, amidst the clamour of Brexit negotiations, British parliament was disrupted enough to declare a climate emergency. Government listened. The point of this anecdote being: demanding action through activism can not only have an impact, but it is also an astounding first-hand glance at democracy in full force.
In the vein of using these strikes as an optimistic teaching moment, BTCEA wants teachers across BC to be able to access our Climate Action Unit FREE OF CHARGE this school year. This unit aims to provide educators with action-oriented tools that can help overcome eco-anxiety and dispel climate myths in the classroom. After all, knowledge is power!
This is an incredible rallying cry for teachers to empower students, and so we also want to point any interested parties towards additional resources for talking about the strikes, and climate issues more broadly, in the classroom:
We hope to see you engaged in this exciting time for eco-social education. In closing, Greta’s positive words serve as a far better conclusion than my own:
“It is still not too late to act. It will take a far-reaching vision, it will take courage, it will take fierce, fierce determination to act now, to lay the foundations where we may not know all the details about how to shape the ceiling. In other words, it will take cathedral thinking. I ask you to please wake up and make changes required possible.” - Greta Thunberg
Happy New Year! We hope you had a memorable holiday season and a positive start to 2024. At Be the Change, we are energized and excited for the year ahead!
As 2023 comes to a close and school winds down for winter break, we’re taking a moment to reflect back over the past year. 2023 was a very regenerative time for BTCEA! We developed and delivered our Climate Action, Resilience, and Emotions (CARE) program in communities on the frontlines of wildfires in our province. And as an organization, we prioritized creating space to discuss what decolonization could look like both internally, and in our programming. Here are the highlights:
Hello,
Dear Be The Change community,
As we approach mid-October, I’m reflecting on the changing seasons, from the warm and active days of summer to the cooler and quieter days of autumn. Personally, I’ve noticed a desire to slow down, take on fewer responsibilities, and stay inside where it’s cozy. Have you felt this way too?
As 21st century humans living in a world that operates under capitalism, white supremacy, and other oppressive systems, we can be made to feel guilt or shame about listening & responding to our needs. We are expected to maintain the same energy and productivity levels throughout the year, no matter how cold or dark the days are, how heavy world events feel, or how much we’re struggling in our personal lives.
This is where the concept of regenerative education comes in. Introduced to the BTCEA team by former staff member Jake, regenerative education calls on us to slow down and turn inward to consider our connection with the natural world. It asks us to examine the living systems that are breaking down due to violent human activity (such as fossil fuel extraction, destruction of Indigenous lands, and human-caused flooding and wildfires) and connect this breakdown with our own high levels of stress.