Author: Katrin Brünjes

  • Climate Kick-Off at ProCivitas Gymnasium in Helsingborg

    Maja, Andréa and Lovisa introduce "Redesign the World" to the students
    Maja, Andréa and Lovisa introduce ‘Redesign the World’ to the students

    Wake-Up Call was invited to ProCivitas Private Gymnasium in Helsingborg to organise an explosive Climate Kick-Off for their Year 1 and Year 2 students. So the six of us – Oleg and I coming from Gothenburg, Andréa from Uppsala, Lovisa from Stockholm, and Maja coming from Lund – all arrived in Helsingborg one warm and sunny Friday to share our knowledge and enthusiasm about this topic and to inspire the students to get active too!

    After Oleg Izyumenko welcomed the students and introduced Wake-Up Call and the team, it was time to start with a presentation ‘All About Climate’. Lovisa Lundgren presented how the climate is changing and why, and masterfully explained the science behind the climate change. Even those students who may already have heard about climate change in general were surely given new insights and facts when she spoke about possible feedback effects or presented how many of the global hectares are needed to support our lifestyle today. To underline that the warming of the planet is not as good as it might sound to a freezing Swede or German, Lovisa also presented the ecological and social consequences and costs of climate change, bringing in her own experience from her stay in Bangladesh.

    Having understood the importance of climate change, the next logical question was: “What can we, as young people, do about it?”. Andréa Henriksson presented motivating examples of young people engaged in the climate movement. Also this year, many young Swedes will travel to the negotiations in Poland, COP19, and will participate in the Conference of Youth (COY9) that will take place in Warsaw on November 7–10th. Aside from that, there’s a number of other fun ways to get active, like joining a local environmental group, starting a group of their own, or developing their own idea and putting it into practice.
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  • Countdown to the ‘Young Ideas for Europe’

    Student participants of 'Young Ideas for Europe' from IEGS with their teacher, Helen Quested (front row, left)
    Student participants of ‘Young Ideas for Europe’ from IEGS with their teacher, Helen Quested (front row, left) © IFOK GmbH

    For 25 students at the International English Gymnasium Södermalm (IEGS) in Stockholm this week will be quite extraordinary. They won’t have their normal curriculum with Math, History, and Swedish on the schedule, but instead will work full-time with developing visions for Europe’s future energy policies. The project week, happening simultaneously at IEGS in Sweden and at a partner school in Lithuania, is a kick-start for this year’s cycle of the EU-wide project called Young Ideas for Europe and will be facilitated by Wake-Up Call for the third time in Sweden.

    Last Friday we had a meeting with the students to introduce the coming project week and discuss broad energy trends and issues with them. Next to discussing practical questions – What each day’s agenda will look like? What will be happening? Who is Wake-Up Call? – we took a first glance at the need for new European energy policies. Also, the students got materials about the EU, its political institutions, its decision-making procedures and its role in the modern world, for further preparations at home.

    Then on Saturday Wake-Up Call’s project team met for the final and thorough briefing before the project week. To ensure a smooth process we went through the week’s schedule and made decisions regarding each team member’s individual responsibilities and discussed what is left to do before the project’s kick-off on Tuesday. And as this week will be all about energy, we will try to keep the students “energised” throughout the entire four days of the project. We are called Wake-Up Call for a reason, you know… 😉