Tomorrow Today

[

] 79

selects youth’, meaning that the delegates formed the centre of deci-

sion-making; ‘youth educates youth’, where the 69 facilitators aged

19 to 27 years old encouraged participation, facilitated contents

and workshops and constructed the entire event together with

the coordinating team, through trust in their capacity to assume

transformative actions; and, ‘one generation learns with another’,

whereby the 110 adult chaperons participated intensely, both in

caring for their delegations and in debating educational policies

amongst themselves, resulting in a solid partnership between

several generations. This characteristic becomes especially impor-

tant since it allows innovative ideas to circulate – while children

and youth easily absorb new tendencies, they depend on adults

to provide the conditions for changes to happen, based on deeper

knowledge and effective dialogue.

In other words, by assuming a dialogical, co-educational and inter-

generational approach that encompasses the diversity of natural life,

culture, ethnicity and plurality of knowledge and understanding, the

conference setting amplified the dimensions of learning and policies

of education for sustainability. This initiative can be considered an

environmental education open to the ‘pluriverse’, a term coined by

Indian philosopher Raimon Panikkar.

The final event as a whole could be considered a harmonious

and stimulating environment. Each participating adult, youth and

child provided positive evaluations, with an average of 90 per cent

of the responses to all questions (methodology, culture, well-being

and organization) being ‘excellent’ or ‘good’. Qualitative terms such

as ‘marvellous’, ‘great’ and ‘incredible’ appeared many times on the

written forms. One adult made a generalization and nicknamed

Brazilian education a ‘pedagogy of happiness’!

Where to from here?

The question remains: how can all of this be incorporated in

formal education inside the classroom? How can we create a school

community with a responsible and committed attitude towards local

and global socio-environmental issues?

The debate began with the Brazilian Ministries of Education and

the Environment inviting national governments to transform their

schools and local communities into public spaces of education for

all, throughout life, in the search for healthier societies. Now that

the event is over, the debate returns to the school communities,

which are not limited to reproducing knowledge, principles and

responsibilities, but above all can become producers of new knowl-

edge and further actions.

This first Children and Youth International Conference, ‘Let’s

Take Care of the Planet’, needs to be a lot more than a beautiful

memory of an event. It should become a reference for educa-

tors in different countries and regions of the world in unveiling

methods and concepts to be studied, adapted and replicated,

and especially for contributing to the diffusion and advance

of fundamental learning practices for addressing global socio-

environmental changes.

Through the activities and the inter-generational dialogues, big

steps were taken in the direction of great objectives: empower-

ing delegates to assume global responsibilities and local actions,

strengthening youth networks and movements, and advancing the

implementation of integrated and sustainable educational policies

with educators from the participating countries. This commitment

is expressed in the Musical Charter: ‘Let’s Take Care of the Planet’,

composed by the children during the conference.

Such a successful educational process, which

reached so many countries and involved exten-

sive cooperation, continues at a distance through a

Virtual Learning Community (VLC),

which encour-

ages more school communities to think globally and

act locally for sustainability. The delegates mobilize

their schools as well as other individuals who partic-

ipated in the preparatory stages and International

Conference activities. In the VLC, everyone can

reaffirm and spread the knowledge of sustainabil-

ity from their local cultures, while at the same time

expressing their dreams and enjoying a rich sharing

of information. In this way, the network of care for

the planetary biosphere expands.

In future, Brazil will promote continuity by orienting

a new international cycle, namely the Second Children

and Youth International Conference, ‘Let’s Take Care of

the Planet’, beginning in 2011 and ending in 2014. The

new cycle requires articulation at least in three areas:

• A national government that, through its education

ministry, invites countries and hosts the event

• International organizations of multilateral

cooperation that support the host country in

mobilization and organization activities

• Civil society organizations, which may anchor the

conceptual and methodological principles of care,

participation and democracy in the process and the

event, and maintain the concepts of responsibilities

and actions.

Further articulation includes involving students, teachers,

youth and school communities in building sustainable

societies, founded in equality, diversity and justice.

The conference’s main theme, climate change, still

brings further needs and deeper educational challenges,

as highlighted by the latest Intergovernmental Panel

on Climate Change publications. In Brazil, besides the

conference cycles, this issue was also included in the

2008 National Plan on Climate Change, making the

Ministry responsible for “implementing sustainable

educational spaces through adapting buildings (school

and university) and management, and through teacher

education and including the subject of climate change

into the curricula and teaching material.”

The Ministry now seeks to achieve new goals for

addressing global social and environmental changes

through launching even bolder and more progressive

policies that integrate school disciplines with traditional

knowledge, and constructing school communities that

consider all aspects of quality of life – environmental,

economic, political, social, cultural and ethical. In the

name of concrete action, and inspired by the British

experience, this new programme, Sustainable Schools,

trains teachers, students and communities to build,

manage and study sustainability.

To consider schools as a reference for sustainable

spaces that have the intentionality to educate local

communities may be another possible dream to be

pursued by the global networks fostered by the DESD.