On 23 July, we held our last coordination meeting of the summer season. An internal moment in the #partnership to take stock of what has been done and plan the next steps of the project.
In the coming months we expect an online event with links from #France, #Poland, #Italy and #Hungary, an international meeting in #Brussels, the continuation of our communication campaign, several national give-back events and much more!

March 2022 saw the start of the partnership between the WANE – We Are Nature Expedition project and C4C. The aim of the partnership is to promote biodiversity education in schools by spreading among students not only knowledge of the ecological principles behind conservation but a critical awareness and emotional and empathetic intelligence towards nature.

The pilot project, currently in its first phase, involved a third grade class at the Avogadro Institute in Turin. The pupils initially participated in an interactive workshop aimed at:

-explain what biodiversity is and what it has to do with our daily lives;

-what are the impacts of human activities on species and ecosystems;

-how to use social media to communicate science;

-how to communicate biodiversity effectively;

-how to build a report from the shared experience on how the WANE project was born and developed.

The students, divided into four groups, were able to choose from some of the species and stories that are part of the WANE project (grizzly bear, monarch butterfly, Tlalocohyla celeste, and common hammerhead shark) and, after having independently explored their characteristics, presented social content whose aim is to spread their importance globally and promote their conservation.

Starting in January 2024, the second phase will see the class engaged in transferring the knowledge they have learnt to the local context, creating a virtual ecological corridor between species, communities, cultures and ecosystems of the North and South American continents, and the reality they see every day. In doing so, they will have to transform themselves into active citizens, into reporters and communicators capable of finding a captivating story and triggering empathy, as well as making them understand how each element of the Planet is inextricably connected to another.

The project, as a whole, aims to put biodiversity back at the centre of the discussion, explaining how Homo sapiens, who represents only 0.01% of the species we know, actually started what is now called the Sixth Mass Extinction but can also be a driver of change. In doing so, we can and must also start with the stories of those fighting for the planet, how we communicate them, and a new way of being human.

In this, education plays a key role in ensuring the emergence and development of the next generation of decision-makers and citizens who are informed, critical, competent and consequently able to act in favour of biodiversity.

photo by Davide Agati for WANE – We Are Nature Expedition project

On 1 December, the project partners met online to discuss progress and plan future steps. The meeting focused on organising the training in Budapest that will involve students from the four project countries.

The participating students will have the opportunity to exchange ideas and build a European network while increasing their awareness of climate change and developing their critical thinking.

The geolocalised map of project activities is online. Explore it to find out how the project moves across Europe.