Organisation
Lambeth Council
Theme
Adaptation
Goals
Resilient communities, Equality
Pupils from Lambeth schools put their creative and digital skills to use during Lambeth’s Campaign for Climate Day, creating social media videos about climate topics important to them.
The Campaign for Climate Day was designed to give Lambeth pupils agency and a voice in championing climate issues and solutions that were important and impactful to them and provide them with the opportunity to learn and develop communication and influencing skills that aren’t typically associated with a STEM topic such as climate. s
Achieving climate justice in Lambeth is a key ambition for the council. Many residents are particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change due to factors such as high population density, poor housing, deprivation, low income, and poor health. Young people will face the impacts of climate change disproportionately compared to other generations. Young people also report much higher levels of climate anxiety and worry, so giving them a platform to speak and opportunities to take meaningful action is vital in combatting that.
The event also supports the Child Friendly Lambeth programme, a partnership between Lambeth Council and UNICEF UK that promotes children’s rights as set out in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. The programme aims to embed young people’s voices across the borough's operation and planning, and the Campaign for Climate Day was a chance for council officers to find out which issues are most important to Lambeth schools.
The event was led by Lambeth’s Future Fit School Network, which is the council's provision for supporting Lambeth schools in taking climate action. The network was set up in 2022 as part of Lambeth’s Climate Action Plan (opens in a new window) and the Department for Education’s Sustainability and Climate Change Strategy (opens in a new window), which aims for schools to become Net Zero, improve climate education, and boost biodiversity.
On Friday, October 11, six schools participated in a day of climate workshops and video creation. The Climate Justice workshop was led by GenEarth (opens in a new window), a non-profit social enterprise that focuses on mobilising young people to have a positive impact on conservation, climate change, and animal welfare. The group learnt about climate justice, social inequality, and how climate change will impact us all differently.
The students then started developing their ideas into campaign plans. Let’s Go Zero (opens in a new window) (LGZ) is a national campaign that unites teachers, pupils, parents, and their schools to work together to achieve net zero carbon by 2030. The team from LGZ presented examples of influential and impactful campaigns and broke them down so students could use the templates to create their own. Once the groups had chosen a climate issue important to them or their schools, they built a campaign using Why, What, and How to help form an informative and impactful message.
Then, it was time for a vegetarian and vegan lunch supplied by the local community kitchen, The Platform Café (opens in a new window).
After lunch, the pupils put their ideas and plans into action and worked on creating scripts, choreography and even songs to support their campaign message. Young Creator UK (opens in a new window) set up a pop-up studio in the hall, where students got to use mics and film their short videos.
It was really inspiring to see how invested and enthusiastic the groups were as they practised their script delivery and sketches. After filming, some groups worked on posters and leaflets to support their campaigns, and others had a chance to play some Eco Action games before it was time for a group picture and vegan cupcakes.
Each group produced a short video on a different topic, such as food waste, air pollution, and biodiversity. The pupils entirely led the concepts, inspired by work they felt proud of in their schools, like composting, food waste, or problems they wanted to solve, like littering.
You can watch the complete compilation of the video below:
Play Video
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The schools returned with climate action bags supplied by SERCO and household energy-saving kits to distribute to families or use in their classrooms.
All schools that participated in the event got copies of the videos to showcase in their school’s help to campaign for change. The videos will also be posted across Lambeth Council’s social media channels to inspire climate action in Lambeth residents straight from the mouth of the next generation!
It was a really good day - great to work with you, GenEarth and YCUK and very inspiring to see the students being so excited and engaged about creating their campaigns.
- Let’s Go Zero team.
