Youth Environmental Summit 2014
The “Youth Environmental Summit” (Y.E.S.) is Rockway’s annual environmental awareness chapel where we focus on learning to live in more sustainable ways. A lot of what you hear these days about the state of our Earth’s natural systems is gloomy. Instead of focusing only on the negative, we thought we’d try to take a more hopeful approach. We invited presenters to come and share their environmental ideas and experiences with us. Through this event we were inspired to make choices that help us to live in more environmentally friendly ways.
This year we have three fantastic speakers who shared with us.
1) Emily Martin, is a former Rockway student, who now attends the University of Guelph and studies in a program called Environmental Governance. We learned about the surprising amount of resources required to produce plastic water bottles. We were introduced to the concept of “manufactured demand”, where corporate interests create a demand for a product that is not necessary in this context. She has kick-started a campaign to ban plastic water bottles at her university and shared about her experiences in student activism.
2) Robert Veitch spoke about the major efforts that MCC (Mennonite Central Committee) Ontario has taken to make their new building at 50 Kent Street more eco-friendly. Students learned about interesting new possibilities in building design and engineering. Robert was able to make his discussion about building envelopes, heat exchange in ventilation systems, and run-off water capture, interesting to a crowd of teenagers (no small accomplishment!) He talked about the rewards and challenges of trying to build in more sustainable ways.
3) Rod Regier is the Executive Director of Economic Development for the City of Kitchener. He has been very involved in the region’s plan to develop a LRT (Light Rapid Transit) System. This ambitious development plan has been controversial, with some people feeling it is too expensive for our relatively small city to undertake. Mr. Regier shared his special perspective on this project and talked about the impact the LRT is expected to have on people’s lives in Waterloo Region. He helped us understand ways in which the region’s environmental sustainability and economic development are deeply connected and not necessarily opposing forces.
Thanks to strong presentations from these three excellent speakers, students were able to learn a lot of important things that they can use to build a greener future.
Steffan Pauls
