Recent news from Walkkingthetalk.bc.ca newsletter- short monthly collection of recent member postings on the walkingthetalk website.
We are proud to announce the recent publication of “Taking Action: British Columbia’s Universities and Colleges Respond to the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Targets Act” a report produced for the BC Working Group and Network on SustainabilityEducation.
British Columbia’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Targets Act (GGRTA or the Act) puts into law the GHG reduction commitments made in the province’s Climate Action Plan and sets a progressive path to find solutions to climate change. Enacted in November 2007, GGRTA requires that core government and all Public Sector Organizations (PSOs) be carbon neutral beginning in 2010. This new policy direction will have profound impacts on how colleges and universities operate. A truly sustainable institution is one in which conservation is embedded into all aspects of the institution including curriculum, strategic planning, purchasing, and the day to day behaviour of students, staff and faculty.
We undertook this study to find out how, one year after the introduction of the Act, post secondary institutions were responding—what actions they have taken and what challenges they are facing. This study builds on the work done in an earlier report titled "Taking Stock: Report on Sustainability in Universities and Colleges in BC" (Owens & Moore, 2008) which found that colleges and universities in BC face substantial barriers to achieving sustainability including bureaucratic inertia, lack of funding, and lack of awareness and communication. These barriers are even more pressing now that a timeline has been set in law for changing how post secondary institutions operate.
This research will contribute to British Columbia’s Climate Action strategy by clarifying the requirements and structure of the Act, drawing attention to the challenges that post secondary institutions will face in implementing the Act, and inspiring greater collaboration and sharing of best practices.
Shared resources:
Upcoming events
Slow Food Cycling Tours – Aug 22 & 23, 2009
Slow Food is a non-profit, member-supported organization that was founded in 1989 to counteract fast-food, fast-life, and the disappearance of local food traditions. The Slow Food Cycle Tours contribute to a culinary culture, helping to raise awareness about food production and providing a link between farmers and food consumers in a unique and fun-filled way.
Web resources
The PICS Climate Solutions Network has been designed to facilitate communication and collaboration among researchers, scientists, policy-makers and other stakeholders in the area of climate change. It will also enable climate change researchers to connect with experts in other fields, in order to address the interdisciplinary nature of climate change research and to harness the intellectual resources of experts within British Columbia and beyond. This database provides access to key contacts across academia, government, the scientific community, and the private and non-profit sectors that are collectively engaged in activities related to the four main functions of the Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions:
- Understanding the patterns and magnitude of climate change;
- Evaluating the physical, economic and social implications;
- Assessing options and developing solutions;
- and Communicating climate change issues to government, industry and the general public.
Sector-specific postings:
K-12 education
The Environmental Learning and Experience Curriculum Maps for K-12
The ELE Curriculum Maps has been developed to help teachers turn theory into practice for environmental learning by connecting learning outcomes across K-12 curricula with elements of the ELE Guide. Teachers adept at integrating the environment and sustainability into their practice are often well aware of these curriculum links, while others may find the connections less obvious. These maps help to show us where the connections already exist, and how we might further incorporate environmental themes into our teaching and learning.
With the release of the ELE Guide and Curriculum Maps, educators in BC have a stronger foundation on which to base their teaching around the environment and sustainability.
Higher education
Simon Fraser University-Burnaby, British Columbia on May 19-22, 2010
Diversity, sustainability and environment: Exploring cultural and practical diversity for environmental learning
Call for Submissions – Deadline November 1st, 2009
What is planned for the EECOM 2010 conference is a focus on the diversity present within the field of environmental learning, both culturally and practically. We therefore encourage high quality, collaborative proposals which celebrate diversity in perspectives, methods and/or cultural contexts for the 2010 conference. Proposal and abstract submission are now available online (send proposals to eecom@sfu.ca). Deadline November 1st, 2009.
Non-formal education
The T’Sou-ke Smart Energy Group
The T’Sou-ke Smart Energy Group (T’SEG) has been created with the purpose of educating the T’Sou-ke community about the importance of low impact sustainable energy, through the use of culture, traditional values and historical means of communication.
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This is just a sneak peak at what the walkingthetalk is all about. Visit their web site at http://www.walkingthetalk.bc.ca/
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