What an amazing evening!  Going to UTSC (University of Toronto, Scarborough Campus) to see David Suzuki speak was mind blowing.  His words and passion filled the lecture hall.

Aleksandra Nasteska (@aleksandrarocks) representing We Canada (@wecanada), and Earth Summit engaged the crowd with information about the Earth Summit taking place in Rio in a few months.  She discussed many issues as Canadians, we need to work on to create a sustainable planet.   She spoke of the importance of young people to stand up and demand change from the people in power that are exploiting the Earth.   Those that are using up resources, polluting our communities are leaving nothing to future generations.

Suzuki wasn’t concerned about the Earth as he stated it was here long before us and will be long after us.  His concern was for the biosphere and the health of all living things on our planet.

A question was asked at the end of the night about what jobs we should go into to stop climate issues.  He made it very clear that we need people in all industries, we need mechanics, we need researchers as well, but whatever profession people do look at it with a green / biocaentric lens.  As a mechanic you can recycle oil, maintain vehicles, and look into cleaner cars.  All jobs are important.  I think as educators we need to look into this.

He also disagreed with the post secondary system in that we are too tightly streamed into categories of either arts or sciences.  We need to fuse them and as teachers we need to embed the environment into all levels of curriculum.  The David Suzuki curriculum is looking to role out more environmental curriculum that prepares students with science literacy.

Great Quotes From The Evening:

“If we back off & give nature a chance maybe she will surprise us. That is my hope”

“Water is like Air, we are glued together through these elements. We are the Earth and the Fire.”

“We need to live more simply and focus on community”

“…the monster has landed and it’s us”

“Nature may be far more forgiving than we deserve”

“Environmentalism is not a discipline…it is a way of seeing our place on the planet”

“We have to see the world through a bio centric point of view”

“Corporations have no right to be a part of the electoral process – that’s for us”

“Capitalism, corporations, borders. We invented these abstract constructs. And if we can create them, WE CAN CHANGE THEM!”