Think Global, Teach Local
All too often educators operate in silos. We’re spearheading collaboration among environmental clubs and educators across our county.
Sharing best practices through Westchester.
Bringing Westchester students and educators together in a unified effort to meet head-on this generational challenge.
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The goal here is to find ways to connect Westchester environmental clubs to share activities, ideas, and best practices.
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Climate change and the environment are being taught in schools across Westchester. Why not share best practices at the elementary, middle school, and high school levels?
Clearly solving climate change as a problem will require unprecedented cooperation and collaboration.
In his recent book How to Avoid a Climate Disaster, Bill Gates makes clear the nature of the transformative global challenge being faced by humanity as it relates to climate change.
In an interview with Anderson Cooper, he was asked, “You believe this is the toughest challenge humanity has ever faced?”
Bill Gates answers: “Absolutely!!! The amount of change, new ideas, is way greater than the pandemic. And it needs a level of cooperation that would be unprecedented.”
That should start right here in Westchester by bringing together Westchester environmental clubs and educators.
Every school in Westchester County teaches environmental science. Most schools have environmental clubs. However, how often do Westchester educators get a chance to work with other Westchester educators to share best practice? How often do students in the environmental clubs have the opportunity to work with fellow students across Westchester County? How often does either group get a chance to work with their local municipal sustainability committees to begin to put in place real world environmental solutions?
Thinking Globally, Acting Locally
Another important component of the WCG USA program is understanding that we need to Act Locally and Think Globally.
While this is a phrase that many use, few really put it into real-world practice. WGC USA is committed to helping Westchester youth build global competence as an important part of this process. As such, Westchester youth will become conversant with the Conference of Parties (COP) process run by the UNFCCC and that led to the Paris Agreement and the COP 27 gathering that took place in Egypt in November 2022.
Students will know that the principal conclusions coming from COP 27, which is the latest global consensus thinking on climate change, are that the planet needs to achieve 50% Net-Zero by 2030 and we need to double contributions to the resource-poor areas of our planet so that they can begin to address their country’s development using green technologies from the beginning.
The end goal here is to help encourage Westchester youth to be the most Eco Literate, Eco Collaborative in NYS.
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Our youth team will reach out to Westchester educators and environmental clubs encouraging them to participate in our climate change efforts. We will make presentations to Westchester environmental clubs encouraging them not just to collaborate locally but also to think of how they can best contribute to this global challenge.
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Our goal here is to help Westchester students become among the most Eco Literate students in the nation by tapping into the extraordinary educational resource we have here in Westchester County by asking Westchester environmental educators to share best practice across schools and school districts.
Our October Conference
The first successful conference was held on October 9, 2021. Highlight speakers included NYS Senator Shelley Mayer and
World Environment Day Conference
WGC USA followed up this event by supporting FCWC’s April 2nd event before holding a follow-up conference on World Environment Day, June 5th, 2022.