COP26 Youth Engagement Initiative.
We are delighted to announce that between November 2021 and November 2022 we will be conducting our COP26 Youth Engagement Initiative, and we would very much like school and university students, teachers, lecturers, academics and environmental conservationists to become actively involved!
To give you an insight into our current project between the 4th and the 6th of November 2021 our Human Rights Officers and Project Coordinators took secondary school and undergraduate students to COP26.
Our Human Rights Officers and Project Coordinators come from a range of backgrounds including UK Barristers, medical professionals, university lecturers, international relations experts and human rights campaigners who have been actively involved in a myriad of human rights issues for over 40 years.
Consequently, this provided the students with an unparalleled insight into the type and form of career paths that they may like to take but just as importantly it allowed them to gain a rare insight into the various ways that we as a global society can come together in order to mitigate and adapt to the negative impacts of climate change.
However, our engagement with young members of our society does not stop there as we are thrilled to announce that we are currently searching for participants for our COP26 Youth Engagement Initiative.
The primary purpose to which is threefold:
by running a series of practitioner-led and/or academic-led environmental conservation workshops and seminars (January 2022 to July 2022) within your school, college or university we hope to educate and upskill students from a variety of backgrounds on the practical environmental conservation methods they can undertake within their local communities, supported by us, to help their local communities plan for and/or mitigate and adapt to the negative and imminent impacts of climate change. Our hope and primary focus is on ensuring that these students will then be enabled to take these project planning and implementation skills with them into later life.
we hope to benefit our local communities by having students plant trees, take part in and encourage a cycle to school and work initiative as well as host a series of student-led environmental conservation workshops, seminars and lectures (March 2022 to November 2022) for their friends, families, teachers and select members of civil society.
through our Special Consultative Status at the United Nations, we will offer a select number of the students the opportunity to submit written and/or oral statements at United Nations environmental conservation conferences and events in order to further cement their knowledge and commitment to helping their local communities overcome the many challenges of climate change.
Therefore, in summary, our objective is to provide school and university students with the requisite knowledge, training and support to become independent environmental campaigners and strengthen local community knowledge and commitment through the joint planning and implementation of practical environmental conservation projects in their locality.
Our project will support the development of long-term climate action within our local communities by engaging, educating and upskilling students and members of civil society in all of the various ways that they can individually and collectively help to mitigate and adapt to the negative impacts of climate change.
Encourage the local community to plan for the climate emergency
Our project will encourage the local community to plan for the climate emergency by bringing together students and local community representatives to decide on, plan for and if at all possible implement joint environmental conservation projects within the local area. In other words, our ambition is not only for the students themselves to formulate and implement school, college or university-specific projects but also to co-coordinate larger projects in conjunction with local community authorities and leaders. For not only will this enhance the likelihood of these projects accurately reflecting the wider needs of the community but also the various ideological standpoints within the community.
Celebrate the importance of community-led climate action and encourage more people to become involved in climate conservation
In Sikh Human Rights Groups opinion young voices have often been heard but ignored during international climate change conferences and negotiations although they have been found to influence their families’ attitudes more successfully than third party companies or NGOs. Therefore, we will address this by bringing together young persons and adults – who possess the necessary skills and resources that are required to amplify the voices of younger people – to decide upon areas of common agreement and understanding. We will then help them to implement their local community environmental conservation projects. Furthermore, in order to encourage their local commitment, we will incentivise them further by helping them to prepare and submit joint oral and written statements to the United Nations Human Rights Council on the importance of generational collaboration.
Our COP26 Youth Engagement Initiative is funded by the National Lottery Community Fund.
Therefore, all that we will require from your school, college or university to conduct our initiative is the following:
- Access to event space (classroom, seminar room, lecture hall etc…).
- Access to and the use of onsite IT facilities (i.e. electronic whiteboard or projector).
- Advertisement of our initiative to your students, staff and parents.
- The designation of a school, college or university representative. That will take responsibility for the coordination of our initiative within your educational establishment.
- If at all possible we ask those who are interested in participating in this initiative to consider whether they could donate a plot of land towards the students’ tree planting initiative.
and/or
- Whether they could provide refreshments during our student-led environmental conservation workshops, seminars and lectures.
All Sikh Human Rights Group employees who are directly involved in this initiative or will have direct contact with your students possess an up-to-date Enhanced DBS Check and have undertaken a CPD Certified Advanced Safeguarding Children (Level 2) qualification.
At no point throughout our COP26 Youth Engagement Initiative will your students be taken to or arrange any form of demonstration, protest, unlawful activism etc… The sole purpose of this initiative is to provide your students with extracurricular education and training.
