Event speakers included Vancouver city councillor, poets, and comedians
The Western Canada Sustainable Campuses Conference, organized by students each year to raise awareness about issues of sustainability, took place at Simon Fraser University from February 16 to 20. The four day conference, which partnered with other similar youth oriented organizations such as Sierra Youth and Sustainable SFU, convened students from universities across western Canada to network, attend lectures by sustainability leaders, sit in on student presentations, tour forest trails, and participate in activist minded workshops.
The Saturday night keynote at the Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema at SFU Woodward’s featured poets and community leaders. Slam poet Johnny McRae preceded with “A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle” and other poems.
Following, Ginger Gosnell-Myers, the event moderator, gave the floor to speaker Andrea Reimer, a councillor with City of Vancouver, who opened up about her journey from living on the Vancouver streets as a teenager to her current position. Ken Lyotier, founder of United We Can, addressed the youthful audience: “You have the knowledge and ability to raise the bar a little; not just for the people around you but for the planet. It needs to happen.” He insisted on the importance of youth activism. “There is a social issue, an environmental issue, and an economic issue. There are so many opportunities for young people to get involved.” Another keynote speaker, Heather O’Hara, executive director at Potluck Catering and Cafe in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, when asked if she would do a PhD, responded: “I’ve thought about this myself. I wouldn’t. I’d rather spend that 25,000 bucks getting my hands dirty on the ground.” She continued, “That experience, that wisdom, that knowledge. The power of experience from people who are not formally educated. I value that.”
Upon arriving at the conference, attendees were handed living lab manuals for the conference weekend, repurposing covers of old library text books. “The books outlined and set the tone for the weekend. They’re professional and creative and you were able to choose a booklet with a personal touch,” said James McNish, former board member of Sustainable SFU. He added, “I was really excited about the calibre of the people coming to speak. These are people who are doing really innovative and really imaginative projects.”
Richard Loat, an SFU communications student, former Facebook employee, and CEO of Five Hole For Food, encouraged participants at his organizational development workshop to take after the words of the late Mahatma Ghandi: “Be the change you want to see” when approaching the role of community leadership. Loat has taken these words and put them into action personally by founding a charitable organization that has raised funds and over 65,000 pounds of food donations for food banks across Canada by arranging street hockey games.
“The communication paradigm has shifted,” said Loat, relating modern techniques to engage people in traditional relationships to a cause. “We all know the feeling of going hungry. We can identify.”
During the Olympics in Vancouver, Loat put on a hockey game in the middle of Granville Street, which Gregor Robertson participated in. “It was the most childlike sense of happiness I’d ever seen,” recalled Loat of Robertson’s expression while playing street hockey for the charity event. What started as a one-man operation is now a 50-person team, the majority of which came on board through Twitter.
In a class on creative activism, Sean Devlin of Truthfool Communications, a comedian and climate organizer, gave a presentation revealing the history of techniques in creative activism. Participants were later encouraged to engage in brainstorming activities to help their own organizations gain strides in meeting their goals.
“Creative tactics can create millions in earned media,” said Devlin of the value of protests as essentially free public service announcements.
The presentation addressed the power of creating a simplified message for the masses: self immolation in Tunisia, the Filipino texting revolution, sex strikes that ended wars, and Dan Glass’s stunt of attempting to super-glue himself during a press photo handshake to Gordon Brown, the U.K. prime minister at the time, forcing him to address activists opposition to airport expansions.
“As an activist, you are a performer,” said Devlin, “[and] there is one common thread between all these stories: we succeed.”
