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YIP: Going Green… Developing Awareness and Developing Action!

The Kitchener- Waterloo YMCA Outdoor Centre was the site of the YIP Going Green Forum May 23-25th , as several Ontario YACs were joined by participants from Michigan for a weekend of environmental awareness and activation.

Seventeen year old keynote speaker Quinn Runkle of the Sunshine Coast Community Foundation’s Youth SCOOP (Sunshine Coast Organization for Philanthropy) launched the event by talking about her experiences as an environmental activist and innovator, and urged others to take positive action.

Quinn's inspiring and informative presentation can be read here (Powerpoint file).

Other workshops included:

• Taking IT Global’s Train the Trainers session for “Youth Action on Climate Change”
• Julia Kollek’s “Climate Change Presents”
• Ashoka’s Youth Ventures “Dream it. Do it.” And “The Lorax Challenge”
• Michigan Council of Foundations Youth Project on pro-active granting and Michigan YACs taking action on Lake Michigan
• Panel discussion on Environmental Careers and Education
• Walter Palmer presenting on The Climate Project (TCP), Al Gore's effort to engage other people in bringing the climate change message to the public.

Between sessions there was time for canoeing, ropes, campfires and other outdoor activities, but everyone was back at work Sunday morning to consider how they could take home what they learned and apply it to their grantmaking and community leadership activities, and support for other youth in addressing environmental issues. The following ideas that they came up with should be of interest to YACs everywhere!

Taking it Home - Ideas:
simple, solution-focused, education, awareness, publicity

Community	Region
Recycling programs “nude food” (school garbage-free lunches) farmers’ markets enviro-filmfest anti-idle campaigns green boxes bicycle bottle drives “one-book/one community” events eg. 100 Mile Diet garbage warriors car-pooling bike programs convening/organizing events: eg. storyofstuff.org YAC reps in urban planning Forums, conferences, panel discussions Free lunch and info sessions	clean-ups – beach, stream, park tree planting forums, conferences Earth Day Celebrations School board campaigns Collaborative projects/challenges Ashoka Youth Venture partnership Competitions Events
National	International
cross-country dialogues/ discussions/idea sharing more networking YAC exchanges YAC to YAC challenges YIP:Going Green Canada Coordinated letter writing campaigns Monthly Earth Hour Earth Day events Taking IT Global partnership	cross-border events/projects sharing resources, ideas on-line Collaborative projects/challenges Monthly Earth Hour Earth Day events Collaborative projects/challenges Veggie-Q

The Shopping List – What do we need?

• Dedicated team
• Education, awareness
• Balance of personalities and skills
• Task distribution
• Mentors, adult allies
• Foster connections: schools, student councils, environment groups, city council
• Well-organized plans
• Plan “B”
• Communication
• Creative advertising
• Word of mouth
• Realistic goals
• $$
• www.yipcanada.org
• FUN!
• Celebrate success