Speaker Presentations and Resources

Plenary Session 1: Climate 101: What Do You Really Need to Know?

• Curt Stager – Professor, Paul Smith’s College
• You're eager to help spread the word about climate change, but are you sure you have the science straight? Here's a quick reminder of some of the basic "hot topics" that you'll need to "know cold" and be able to present in clear and creative ways, so you are properly empowered in your climate outreach.
• PRESENTATION

Plenary Session 2: Communicating Climate

• Meadow Hackett – Audit Senior Consultant, Deloitte & Touche, LLP
• Gina Fiorile – Student, University of Vermont
• Explore how to communicate with others most effectively about climate change and sustainability through Deloitte's Business Chemistry®. A system that steps beyond helping you understand yourself, Business Chemistry is designed primarily to help you recognize preferences and styles of others—without having them take a test—by measuring observable, business-relevant traits. The focus is on improving the effectiveness of your interactions with other types of individuals, as well as combinations of types in team environments. Business Chemistry can be a helpful tool to learn more about each person on a team and to better understand your audience. This understanding creates awareness and connections and looks to the overall composition of a group and related potential strengths and pitfalls. Once you learn more about your individual type, we determine what to look for in others, and brainstorm ways to engage more effectively with one another.
• Find your specific Business Chemistry Profile by taking THIS SURVEY

Plenary Session 3: Movie Night at The Wild Center

• Time to Choose leaves audiences understanding not only what is wrong, but what can be done to fix this global threat.
  • How to get the film
  • Resources from the movie on how to make change

Concurrent Workshops Session 1

Workshop 1: The World Needs You

• Lily Barraclough, Annemarie Manley, Megan Sheridan, and Lukas Wrede – iMatter
• Who we are, where we come from and how we live in the world are core to our work as climate activists. Facts and figures are important, but we believe authentic stories will change the world. Join youth leaders from iMatter to reflect on what brings you to this work and how it shapes your life to begin to cultivate the unbreakable foundation from which your fierce, powerful and oh-so-needed climate work will grow.

Workshop 2: Communicating Climate Change

• Michael Trumbower – School Programs Coordinator, The Wild Center
• The topic of climate change can sometimes be viewed as a loaded one. It can be daunting and complex, and it may be hard to figure out where to start. We will discuss and navigate this tricky topic using The Wild Center's Science on a Sphere to view some of these global changes and predictions. Additionally, we will explore some methods to communicate climate change developed and tested at museums, zoos, and aquariums around the country.
• PRESENTATION

Workshop 3: Composting: Turning what we waste into what we want!

• Katie Culpepper – Farm Manager, North Country School and Camp Treetops
• Do you see food scraps going into the trash can in your cafeteria and think you should do something about it? Do you already have composting program at your school, but you think it could be better? Do you hear a lot about compost but don’t really know how or why it’s done? Then this workshop is for you! We will discuss what compost is and why we all should care about it, as well as share different methods of composting. Whether it is a worm bin in the classroom, a heaping pile outside your school or a community-scale composter, there is a composting method that is right for your school. Let’s figure it out together!

Workshop 4: The Edible Landscape

• Wynde Kate Reese – Holistic Nutritionist and Owner of Green Goddess Foods
• In this session you will learn about 10 plants that can be used to create or expand your school garden. These plants not only provide food and medicine, they look attractive and have multiple functions within the landscape. After learning about the plants and their attributes, along with ideas on how to incorporate them into your school property, you will have a hands-on lesson in using some of them to make three simple recipes. Participants will engage in the preparation and tasting of these foods to learn how easy it is to harvest and utilize food grown at your school.
• PRESENTATION

Workshop 5: Getting Started on an Energy Efficiency Action Plan

• Susan E. Powers – Director, Institute for a Stable Environment at Clarkson University
• Jan E. DeWaters – Assist. Professor, Coulter School of Engineering at Clarkson University
• Do you think that your school or campus wastes energy? This hands-on workshop will provide all participants with a technical understanding of energy efficiency, why it is important and how to explore the energy inefficiencies in your school building or on campus. Activities will include the use of watt meters and worksheets to list electric energy consuming inventory items to learn how to make an inventory of school electricity use and identify the easiest and most effective areas for change.
• PRESENTATION

Concurrent Workshops Session 2

Workshop 1: How to Get Stuff: Got an Idea? Need Resources to Make it Happen?

• Kate Glenn – Faculty and Sustainability Coordinator, Paul Smith’s College & Adirondack Foundation
• Chris Morris – Communications Officer, Adirondack Foundation
• Whether you need money, supplies, or services help we’ll teach you HOW TO GET STUFF to support your great project ideas. In this session, we’ll talk about how you can leverage your community/ network, request sponsorship from area businesses, nonprofits and private donors, and how to apply for grants and find funding opportunities. Kate and Val from Paul Smith’s College will discuss the college’s Campus Sustainability Fund Grant program, this program was started in 2009 by a group of committed students, since then it’s funded over 350K in student, faculty, and staff projects. Chris from the Adirondack Foundation will talk about funding resources available through the foundation, as well as how they can work with you to develop crowdfunding campaigns to support your initiatives.

Workshop 2: What’s Your Climate Story?

• Jason Davis – Director, Climate Stories Project
• Each of us has a story about how we are observing and responding to the changing climate. However, we often lose sight of our own stories as we react to the abstract science and divisive politics of climate change. In this workshop, you’ll share your own story and interview others about theirs, helping each other gain courage and develop solutions in the face of the transformation of the climate. Teachers will come away with an effective classroom activity that will help their students understand and engage deeply with climate change as a social, rather than just a scientific, issue.

Workshop 3: Think Globally, Eat Locally: Farm to School Sustainability

• Zohar Gitlis – Adirondack Farm to School Coordinator, ADK Farm to School Initiative
• Where does this apple come from anyways? Do you know that New York State is the second largest apple producing state in the country, and that Peru, NY (just 67 miles northeast of the Wild Center) is at the center of the NY apple industry? And do you know that majority of schools in the Adirondacks order apples that are shipped in from Washington State (about 2,800 miles from the Wild Center)? In this session we will investigate our school lunch trays- asking what we can do as student leaders to increase sustainability and decrease the footprint of our school’s lunch program.
• PRESENTATION

Workshop 4: How to Outsmart Waste: The Business of Garbage

• Gina Herrera – US Director, Brand Partnerships, TerraCycle
• Waste is natural to every living system. We all consume and at some point eliminate. Eventually, everything and everyone has an end of life. We may frown on someone who litters or tosses a cigarette butt on the street, but is putting a candy wrapper in the garbage bin - only for it to be trucked to a landfill - much better for the planet? With the more than 4 lbs of garbage the average American discards every day, our individual contributions to this collective trove of waste are hard to countenance, and, largely, we don't. This session will be a hands-on presentation on the idea of garbage and how to view it from a different lens.

Workshop 5: Eco-Schools USA: Exploring the Climate Classroom and Challenge

• Elizabeth Soper – NWF Director of K-122 Education, Eco-Schools National Wildlife Federation
• Come find out about National Wildlife Federation's school sustainability program, Eco-Schools USA. Explore the seven step guided framework and 12 pathways of sustainability and learn how you can gain recognition for the work you are doing at your school. You may already be eligible for an award! You will also have a chance to dig into the Climate Change pathway and the Cool School Challenge where you will learn how to assess and quantify your school's carbon footprint and investigate solutions. We will engage in hands-on use of kilowatt and light meters and find out just how much juice some of those energy vampires are really using. Additional resources will be available to support your climate work at your school!
• PRESENTATION

Concurrent Workshops Session 3

Workshop 1: Our Time to Rise: Building Power, Making Change and Winning Election

• Brian Stillwell – National Youth Organizer, Sunrise Movement
• Young people have always been at the forefront of change. We spearheaded the civil rights movement, the environmental movement, the movement to end apartheid in South Africa. Now with climate change threatening our health, our safety and our right to a livable planet, it’s time for our generation to rise again! In this workshop, you’ll learn how social movements hold the key to building the just, climate-stable future we all deserve. You’ll learn how to organize your community to take collective action. You’ll learn how to launch campaigns, build people power, pass policies and win elections! A better future is within our reach - all we need is your leadership to make it happen.
• PRESENTATION

Workshop 2: Home Heating and Climate Change: What Can YOU Do About it?

• Mariah Keagy – Educator, Vermont Energy Education Program
• best thing YOU could do to change this? Come to this workshop to figure out how you can answer this question. We will use models, stations and IR cameras to discover the most effective way to keep heat in our houses longer. You may be surprised at how easy it is to make a difference in your current (and hopefully future!) home.

Workshop 3: North Country Food Justice Working Group: What Do Food Access, Farm Labor, and Social Equity Have to Do With Climate Change?

• Zohar Gitlis – Adirondack Farm to School Coordinator, ADK Farm to School Initiative
• The Food Justice Working Group (FJWG) is a new coalition of nonprofit and for-profit organizations, community members, local businesses, farmers and farm workers, and government agencies who have come together to start the conversation about creating a more equitable food system in the North Country. Zohar Gitlis of the FJWG will discuss the project and the relationship between social and environmental equity, before offering ideas for how interested youth can get involved here in the North Country.
• PRESENTATION

Workshop 4: Where Does Gasoline Go?

• Don Duggan-Haas – PhD, Director of Teacher Programs, The Paleontological Research Institution
• Americans burn more than 390 million gallons of gas a day. A single gallon weighs nine pounds but the chemical reaction that is the burning of that gas yields 19 pounds of carbon dioxide. A collaborative visualization steps through the chemistry allows us to “see” how much volume it now occupies. In small groups, we will also complete an easily replicable hands-on demonstration showing the power of carbon dioxide to warm the air. These activities are companion activities to The Teacher-Friendly Guide to Climate Change. Other features of the book, available as a free PDF and useful to anyone who wants to teach about climate, will also be highlighted in the session.

Workshop 5: Working With Your Community to Achieve Climate Goals

• Dazzle Ekblad – Climate Policy Analyst, NYS Dept. of Environmental Conservation - Office of Climate Change
• Have you ever wondered how to engage with your larger community? Did you know there’s support available through the Climate Smart Communities Program and NYSERDA’s Clean Energy Communities Program? This session will offer guidance on how students can engage with local governments on clean energy and climate action projects. From internships to college classes to joint task forces, come brainstorm with us about how you can help your town reduce emissions and adapt to a changing climate. Learn from the great partnerships that are happening in places like Central NY with SUNY ESF and in the Mid-Hudson with Cornell University.
• PRESENTATION