Ever since thousands of students took part in the "Fridays for Future" demonstrations, most people must have realised how concerned the younger generations are about our environment.
Because of Corona, demonstrations are no longer allowed and things have quietened down a bit.
"Schools for Future" came at just the right time for many to continue working on this issue.
Many impulses for rethinking
Earlier this year, we shared a blog post about our cooperation with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ). It was about the educational competition "Schools for Future - Your ecological footprint counts" for grades 7 to 12.
The aim was to create a social media effective campaign in class on the topic of CO2 emissions and their consequences.
The competition started in January and was scheduled to run for 4 months. In the meantime, 18 contributions from all age groups from schools all over Germany have arrived.
We are positively surprised by so many suggestions and the creativity with which the ideas have been implemented in the submitted contributions.
On Monday 3rd of May, the online jury meeting took place. Together with our partners the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, one of the most renowned daily newspapers in Germany, and Helliwood media & education, an agency that brings media and education together.
We had to face the difficult task of choosing a winner. Many contributions came in, ranging from videos, to poetry, Instagram posts, posters, TV and radio broadcasts. Because of this spectrum of posts, the decision was not easy.
Award ceremony
The final event and award ceremony took place on Monday 10th of May. Last autumn, when we started this project, it was planned to hold a presence event in the rooms of the FAZ in Frankfurt. For well-known reasons, unfortunately this was not possible. We had to do a video conference instead. We regret this very much, as we were looking forward to discussing with the participants and deepening some points.
Our conclusion
We were overwhelmed by the contributions and their content. The students show that climate change and their own carbon footprint are enormously important to them. They draw attention to the problems of climate change in a variety of ways and show how they can save CO2 in their private environment by doing little things.
For example, saving plastic, separating waste correctly, buying seasonal and regional products or simply saving electricity can have a significant impact. And thus also a small step towards improving our CO2 emissions.
Through the project and the cooperation, we have also learned a lot ourselves. We are enthusiastic about the commitment of the young people and take a lot of things with us into our everyday life and our business life.
A big thank you goes to the supporting teachers who actively helped in the background and integrated climate change and protection into their lessons.