My Oral Practice class of translators and interpretors in training recently has been working on climate and climatology. We watched "An Inconvenient Truth" and it really motivated the students here to make a local difference. In Ukraine, the environmental movement is almost nonexistent. There is trash on the streets, people litter without concern, the topsoil is eroding because of no grass in most public areas, and industrial pollution is widespread; yeah, and think of Chernobyl. So, the information in the film was for these students like a revelation.
Generally, on the whole, Ukrainians feel very unempowered. But these students are seriously motivated to make a change to things they have power over (a loaded statement here) in their local communities. Already they have been unplugging unused appliances and talking to other people to spread the word about global warming. I have been trying to organize some environmental events on Earth Day. The students discussed that they would like to 1) create trilingual (Russian, Ukrainian and English) posters to raise the public's awareness about global warming and environmental involvement, 2) spread grass seed, and 3) clean up trash in public areas.
We will celebrate Earth Day on Saturday, April 19, 2008 (since it falls midweek this year) by cleaning up a park, spreading grass seed as well as picnicking and reading environmental poetry.
I recently wrote to TESOLers for Social Responsibility (an Int'l TESOL Caucus) to solicit materials for the posters (sayings, data, etc) and potential funding sources for the grass seed, printing, and garbage bags that we will need. Ukraine is not a wealthy country, so we would need some minor funding for supplies. I am still looking for a grant agency or an NGO who provides materials of this kind for free.
I have already tried contacting Greenpeace and other organizations in Ukraine only to have my emails bounce back, because the email addresses are no good.
Some of the resources I've already been given include:
http://www.davidsuzuki.org/NatureChallenge/
Sierra Club Take Action page
http://www.epa.gov/teachers/
Earth Day Network
Globio.org*
PlanetPals
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
The Wilderness Society's Teacher's Lounge
Most of them are for the US or Canada. I need one for Ukraine. Hm..
We are meeting on Friday at 2pm Ukraine time for an organizational meeting on the National Technical University "Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute" campus in building y2, room 407 to discuss subcommittee work, etc. All are welcome if you are in the area.
If you all know of any information or resources that you can provide will be much appreciated. Thanks in advance for your help!
Peace,
Kate Mastruserio Reynolds
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