We’ve been working all semester on this event – join us this Saturday, May 22 at Dolores Park in SF!

Featuring hip hop performances, DJ’s, live graffiti art, a resource fair, vendors, the ESLI student project showcase and more!

MANY THANKS to all of our participants, to ESLI Staff and Youth Advisory Board and to Mission High School for hosting! Participants went through 2 incredible workshops, we heard from Keynote Speaker Zakiya Harris about her amazing work, the ESLI Youth Advisory Board led an inspiring youth voice panel, and everyone enjoyed tons of delicious food and snacks and company all day. Not to mention, Lincoln High’s Green Academy students led one of the workshops! – a hands-on empowerment workshop where our participants were able to create self-watering containers and worm bins! All of us at ESLI (staff and youth alike) were proud to host the event, and thank you all for coming and sharing with us!

Here are some quotes from our participating educators (as written on their evaluation forms):

“The day was very inspirational and motivating. It reminded me of why I do the work I do.”
“Thanks for the information, inspiration and opportunity to connect with people in this movement.”
“I think this program can organize the service work of the students to affect positive change on society.”
“The conference was excellent. You balanced the inspiring with the practical. Great job ESLI!”

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ESLI Teachers Conference RESOURCE CD – for DOWNLOAD!
Our participants left with a lot of great tools, knowledge and resources, including our Teachers Conference Resource CD – which has materials from each workshop, as well as a comprehensive community partners’ resource links page!  For any particpants who may have left without one some how, or for anyone who would like to download the contents of the CD – here are links to each document, courtesy of ESLI!

Right click and choose “SAVE AS” to download each file.

• Bay Area Community Resource List & Links! [.doc]
• Hands-On Workshop Materials
  • Self-Watering Container Instructions [.doc]
  • Self-Watering Container Diagram [.jpg]
  • “A Guide to Teaching Sustainability, Permaculture and Systems: Thinking Using Two Buckets” by Sara Laimon [.pdf]
• Environmental Justice: Reinheriting the Earth Workshop Materials
  • Environmental Justice Definitions [.doc]
  • Environmental Justice Principles [.doc]
  • WORKSHOP-’Comparing Lifestyles with an EJ Lens’ [.doc]
  • WORKSHOP-’Intro to EJ’ [.doc]
  • WORKSHOP-’Understanding EJ Principles’ [.doc]
  • SONG-Crown City Rockers-’Last Night’ [.mp3]

The Galileo Academy High School ESLI team (Baby Rai included) at ESLI’s 2010 Teachers Conference, with ESLI staff Ei Ei Khin and Kristia Castrillo.
More pictures to come!

The Dream Reborn Story Contest, sponsored by Green For All, is looking for inspiring examples of how the green economy is creating opportunity for prosperity and advancement in your community – submit a video, song, poem or original artwork for a chance to win $1000, $500 or $250!  See below and click HERE for more info on Green for All’s page.

CONTEST OVERVIEW

The contest features three types of content:

• Video (short documentary or music video-5 minutes or less)
• Audio (without video – can be a song or spoken word)
• Original Artwork (painting, mural, photo etc.)

GUIDELINES

• The content of submissions must be related to green-collar jobs and/or the green economy and not to the support of or opposition to any candidate for public office or any political party
• Content must be submitted between1/18/10-2/08/10.
• The grand prize submission will win $1,000 and a professionally shot video of their story, 2nd place will win $500, and 3rd place will win $250.
• The top three prizes will be decided by an online vote to be held between 2/08/10 and 2/15/10.

Markese Bryant (aka Doo Dat) knows firsthand the effects of pollution and poverty in his community. Now he’s building the movement for an inclusive green economy through campus organizing and community education. Check out Markese’s music video, The Dream Reborn (My President is Green). Watch his personal story, share this page with friends, take action and submit your own art to The Dream Reborn Story Contest for a chance to win $1,000!

via Grind for the Green

Check out the clip here:

Also, stay tuned for more media interviews featuring ESLI’s Youth Delegation coming soon!

We woke up to a rocky start, literally… but had two experiences whose positivity and hope balanced the disappointment from earlier this week.  First, we had the pleasure of being invited on a small Greenpeace fishing boat out into the harbor!  It was freezing, wet and sometimes sea-sick because of today’s bad weather – BUT they took us out to have an exclusing look at Denmark’s windmill farm!

It was definitely a sight to see – especially because what would be built RIGHT next to the windmills, but a coal-fired power plant!!  The visuals were so great.  How ironic, right?

Stay tuned for pics and videos (camera cords are in Ellen’s stolen suitcase!).

Then, we had the HONOR of joining a historic dinner hosted by the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative, of 30-40 EJ leaders from the US that had made it to Copenhagen.  There were folks from all over the country.  Many of the people there were some of the most respected, inspirational leaders of the EJ movement – Dr. Robert Bullard (Clark Atlanta Univ. EJ Resource Center and EJ pioneer), Dr. Beverly Wright (Deep South Center for EJ in New Orleans), Tom Goldtooth (Indigenous Environmental Network), Michael Dorsey (Durban Group for Climate Justice), Felicia Davis (EJCC/Black Women’s Roundtable), Jose Bravo (Just Transition Alliance), Mari Rose Taruc (Asian Pacific Environmental Network), and many others.  And the other folks that were there – about 10-12 of us – represented emerging environmental justice leaders, including Brower Youth Award winner Kari Fulton and the ESLI Youth Delegation!  We were thankful for the knowledge and experience that those leaders brought into the room – and for the relationships we were able to start or support while there!  There was definitely a strong spirit of solidarity and responsibility that was passed on to the new generation.  A few of the older leaders made statements in our go-around introductions that targeted the youth that were there and recognizing their appreciation for our presence.  Dr. Beverly Wright said tonight was the first time she felt satisfied that the movement they had created from the ground up was okay to pass on and to allow youth to inherit the work of the environmental justice community.

Videos and pics of this will also be posted soon.

Anyway, we’ve directed our energy to continuing to meet and network with youth and other activists from the outside – attending Klimaforum, and meetings and events around the city.  So, bear with us and our recent angry posts – more positive, inspiring stories to come!  Don’t forget to please let us know your thoughts, it’s GREAT to hear from our support system back at home.

Lastly, we’ve been taking amazing photos and videos of our experience – but my connection cords to upload them are in my suitcase which was lost en route to Copenhagen! (Yup, I’ve been wearing the same clothes for three days).  We also have a hard time finding a good internet connection.  Hopefully we’ll be able to get some up soon.

UN : a people’s process?

Dear UN:

We are losing faith in you quickly. Please advise.

With love,
Future Leaders

As Copenhagen boils with anxiety about today’s mass climate justice action at the Bella Center, all I can do is lower my head at the United Nations in complete disappointment.

Shutting out thousands of representatives of civil society from entering the UN conference this week, without showing a drop of compassion, has put me teetering on the edge of renunciation. We came to the UN conference to represent ourselves, as young leaders from the US and youth of color who believe that our presence here matters, and that the story we share can benefit the international community. What we faced Monday night and Tuesday morning, standing in the incredible line of 2nd week registrants waiting to get their badges – waiting a total of 7 hours in freezing temperatures, was offensive. And, from what we found out, we were lucky that it was only 7 hours – people we interviewed had stood for 9 hours on Day 1, only to be turned away on Day 2’s attempt after another 3-4 hours. A pregnant women, a high-profile expert consult to the Mozambique delegation, waited both days only to be forced to leave because of fear of her and her baby’s health. And not once did we receive clear updates on our potential to register as we stood in line. Not once did they show any compassion to the thousands of dollars and false hopes these thousands of people had spent to make it merely 20-30 feet from the Bella Center, only to be told that the UN could not accommodate numbers anywhere near to what was expected. Many got on early flights home.

I write this post as an indignant member of the next generation of climate justice leaders, who had nevertheless held onto her faith in an entity who has practically failed to address climate change for the past 15 years of the UNFCCC’s operations. The democracy here in Copenhagen is quickly crumbling before me, before the eyes of the two ESLI youth delegates that came with me and before the rest of the international community. Not to mention, police raids and preemptive arrests targeting young people has turned Copenhagen into a place of fear. Access to UN climate negotiations was already assumed to be limited to civil society – but now we know that we are blatantly not welcome.

For better or for worst, I’ve also seen in the past 48 hours the prolific organizing that’s happening on the outside. Monday night I participated in a meeting of grassroots groups from both the Global North and Global South, organized by Movement Generation, that pulled together powerful movement building voices together to strategize. Yesterday, environmental justice groups from the US drafted a letter to Obama that calls for just, urgent action on climate that will be delivered in a press conference at the US Embassy on Thursday. Klimaforum – the alternative “People’s Summit” – is rich with information, speakers and real people power that outshines UN side events 50 times over – and it’s free, accessible and well-organized. This is where we’ll spend most of our time for the rest of the week.

But where does this leave us, still depending on the UNFCCC to come to an agreement to protect our future? An issue so deeply embedded in economic injustice and the oppression of developing countries and impacted communities – how can we believe in a just, acceptable solution from such an undemocratic, non-transparent decision making body? As a young activist and leader, as well as a mentor of other young leaders, I stand horribly disappointed at the UN and fearful of our loss of faith in it as an institution. What now?