AAEE NSW’s recent conference, ActiveNature, struck a timely and urgent chord – with global climate strikes by students and protest actions across the world there is a growing understanding that education and active citizenship will be vital tools to address the climate crisis we face.
Over three days, almost 200 educators from a broad range of sectors and locations came together in beautiful Kirrawee to take a deep dive into the topics of learning, citizenship and activism for sustainability. It was a reinvigorating and energising time where participants shared ideas, swapped stories and resources, acknowledged others and were acknowledged themselves, discovered wisdoms and left united in a common pursuit of a vibrant and safe climate future.
Highlights (though it’s hard to single them out from an exceptional pool of speakers!) included hearing from 8-year old Ruby the Climate Change Kid, student activist Nosrat Fareha and of course the ever encouraging and inspiring Costa Georgiadis.
As a legacy of the conference, the conference presentations are available through the interactive program on our conference website. We encourage you to head to the website, look through the interactive program for your session/speaker of interest, and access any available presentation information.
Our team is also in the process of writing up a reflective piece showcasing examples of education and activism based on different perspectives from a range of different people involved in the conference. This will be put up on the AAEE NSW website when it’s ready.
Our thanks go to the many people who prioritised the time to come, share, learn, connect and inspire others. Huge thanks also go to the team of dedicated organisers and volunteers who made the conference happen – we’re so proud of what we have delivered and so thankful for the hundreds of hours of (mostly voluntary) work put in over more than 12 months to bring this great event together.
We also couldn’t have delivered such a great event without our conference partners and supporters including Return and Earn and the NSW EPA.
It inspires hope and energy to know there are so many wonderful educators working across the country to make their voices heard and their actions count.