An international team of researchers is conducting a survey about national and international participation in environmental education conferences. Particularly, it is looking to find out what barriers to participation exist for environmental education society members. The survey will take about 15 minutes and your responses are anonymous. It is here and the deadline for doing this is September 30th. However, if you’re not someone who goes to international environmental education conferences, it’s not for you and there will be better ways to invest the 15 minutes. §§§§
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The Marine Conservation Society (MCS) is running webinars focused on the UK marine environment, ecosystem, key species, and stressors. These are free and accessible to all. The webinar on Friday 25th September is connected to Beachwatch, the annual beach cleaning event. During Beachwatch events MSC encourages people to not only pick litter but record what they find on a survey sheet. Data are used for national campaigns and have been used to help change governmental polices around plastics. This link has more details on the forthcoming Source to Sea webinar series. All webinars can be booked here. §§§§
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2020 sees the 40th anniversary of Social Farms and Gardens You can find out about the valuable work that it does here. §§§§
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If you want to spread the word about the forthcoming, North American Association for Environmental Education’s 2020 Virtual Conference and Research Symposium, you can use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn . NAAEE says Remember to:
- Use the hashtags #NAAEE2020 and #EnviroEd
- Tag @TheNAAEE on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram
- Share a link to the conference website: conference.naaee.org
- Share the registration brochure
- Share the conference graphics customized for each platform which you can download here §§§§
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And here are three videos that highlight the 30 NAAEE Under 30 finalists this year: Vide1, Vide2, and Vide3. Northern Ireland’s Ian Humphreys will be introducing the 30 Under 30 panel discussion on Friday, October 16th at 2030 BST. If you’re attending the conferences, there are more details about this panel and others here. §§§§
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Gresham College is again hosting online talks on environment topics. Click here for details. §§§§
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Over a 2-week period in June 2020, a virtual global training programme designed for youth and youth workers was designed by a young people from the Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN), the Global Youth Action Team (GYAT) for Biodiversity Protection, and staff from World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). If you’d like to know more about the process, results or concept, please contact Nathan Spees nathan.spees@wwf.at or Alison Flaherty flaherty.alisonm@gmail.com §§§§
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Here are some dates to note:
– Wednesday Sept 30th 1600-1700 a zoom meeting for teachers organised by the London Schools Eco-Network on Covid and school sustainability. Click here to join: ID 932 2985 7675 / Passcode: 626180
– On Tuesday 13th October there’s a virtual Youth Against Carbon conference. It’s not too late to sign up.
– This year Outdoor Classroom Day is on Thursday 5th Nov
– A virtual Youth Climate Summit takes place from the 9th to 13th November. §§§§
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The British Antarctic Survey says that newly discovered deep seabed channels beneath Thwaites Glacier in West Antarctica may be the pathway for warm ocean water to melt the underside of the ice. Data from two research missions, using aircraft and ships, are helping scientists to understand the contribution this huge and remote glacier is likely to make to future global sea level rise. Please email amdi@bas.ac.uk for more detail. §§§§
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British Birds , the monthly journal for birdwatchers, which was founded in 1907, has a new website. So does the GA. §§§§
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Learning to Learn in Nature is about young children learning in wild places, and educators learning with them. It is about being in connection with nature and bringing that connection back to the classroom. But it is also about something more, something that is seen very clearly when children are given the freedom to explore the wild outdoors on their own terms, with daring and imagination. More detail here. §§§§
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The programme for Communicate 2020 is now available to download from the Communicate webpage The meeting will bring together a “unique multi-sector community online to explore five vital themes for the emerging landscape of environmental communications”. Each day of the programme will have 5 timeslots each with a choice of 3 parallel sessions, alongside “fireside chat” style networking slots and “drop back in points” to help you reconnect if you have to switch your attention for part of the day. The “vital themes” are:
- New tools for the new normal
- Intersectionality and environment
- Nature based solutions
- Connecting to places and spaces
- Perspectives and reflections §§§§
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This is our last snippet from How Bad Are Bananas? The Carbon Footprint of Everything by Mike Berners-Lee, which was published on September 3 by Profile Books which we’ll be reviewing at a later date.
A mile by push-bike costs 40g of carbon if powered by bananas, 70g powered by cereals and cow’s milk, 310g powered by cheeseburgers, 4700g powered by air-freighted asparagus. All these figures need 10g–100g per mile adding to account for the bike’s embodied carbon. §§§§