EMPOWERING YOUTH FOR CLIMATE ACTION 2024 AWARD WINNERS
The Empowering Youth for Climate Action Award is given annually to the top Action Projects posted on Our Canada Project to recognize outstanding student leadership and contributions to Canada’s sustainable future.
Thank you to Environment and Climate Change Canada for their generous support of LSF’s Youth Forums and Action Project grants and specifically for making these awards possible!
Each of the winning schools will be given a certificate of achievement acknowledging their successful project in addition to a financial prize to be used for future Action Projects:
- First place: $3,000
- Second place: $2,000
- Third place: $1,000 each
- Runners-up: $500 each
Check out the winning projects below!
To all of the students and teachers who participated, thank you for your wonderful projects! We are truly impressed by the level of creativity, the reach and the efforts behind your Action Projects this year!
FIRST PRIZE:
Fresh Falls Market – James Morden Public School – Niagara Falls, ON
This special project was carried out by the Grade 6/7 class at James Morden Public School in Niagara Falls, Ontario, who were on a mission to bring affordable food prices to their school. The students conducted research and surveys that highlighted the lack of affordable and healthy products available in their community. Based on this discovery, they decided to open the Fresh Falls Market, a school-run fruit and vegetable market. The Fresh Falls market is hosted monthly in the school library and sells $5 produce bags. The students sourced their produce through their partnership with United Way, which provides monthly donations to contribute to the produce in each bag. The students also hoped to provide their community with more locally sourced food. This led to their decision to spend their grant from Learning for a Sustainable Future on hydroponic produce growing systems which have allowed them to add local leafy greens to their bags. The Fresh Falls Market has become a necessary service to their community and the customers are pleased with the affordability and quality of the produce bags. The James Morden Public School students are enthusiastic about its success and the positive impact it has had on their community!
SECOND PRIZE:
La Grainotèque – École Sainte-Anne – Fredericton, NB
The grade 11 and 12 students at École Sainte-Anne in Fredericton, New Brunswick, created a project to tackle five of the Sustainable Development Goals: #2- Zero Hunger, #4- Quality Education, #12- Responsible Consumption and Production, #13- Climate Action and #15 – Life on Land. They aimed to improve food security and lower food costs in their community while improving food quality and quantity! To do so, they started a Seed Library or “grainothèque” in their library where community members can pick up seeds sourced from local nurseries for free! This makes it affordable, easy and accessible for people in Fredericton to grow their own food at home. The students also made a website that provides their community members with instructions to successfully sow the seeds. They decided to expand their project by placing hydroponic growing towers and potted plants around their school to demonstrate to their peers how easy it can be to grow their own food. The students were excited to share their initiative on CBC radio to spread the word across their city!
THIRD PRIZE:
Green Tech Innovators: Sustainable Farming and Climate Solutions – Bairdmore School – Winnipeg, MB
The grade 6 students at Bairdmore School in Winnipeg, Manitoba, went on a journey to learn more about climate change and promote sustainability. These students began by exploring current farming practices and their effect on the natural environment. They used Micro:bit coding to explore solutions to real-world environmental challenges, and they focused on creating practical and innovative strategies for problems like fertilizer runoff and algae blooms, and understanding their impact on aquatic ecosystems. They also studied indoor farming techniques using vertical hydroponic growing towers. The students grew, studied, and harvested produce, gaining hands-on experience with innovative farming techniques. Their project helped them investigate the environmental advantages and disadvantages of various agricultural technologies and taught them the problem solving skills needed to promote a sustainable future.
RUNNER UP:
Jardin Pluvial – École Grand-Digue – Grand-Digue, NB
The students of L’École Grand-Digue in Grande-Digue, New Brunswick, collaborated with the Beausoleil municipality Sustainable Development Group and the Shediac Bay Association to create a rain garden at their school. These gardens allow water to seep into the soil, helping to prevent flooding and maintain a healthy water cycle. They planned and planted their garden using native species and organized community volunteers to care for the plants. To educate their community about the rain garden, they ran a social media campaign and designed and installed weather-resistant outdoor signs at the garden site.
RUNNER UP:
HOME PAILS – A Division of Food for Thought: Sustainable Urban Farming Project – Kapuskasing District High School – Kapuskasing, ON
Kapuskasing District Secondary School in Kapuskasing, Ontario, has been working for a number of years on its Food for Thought – Sustainable Urban Farming project. This project uses hydroponic technology to grow food at the school and reduce the carbon footprint created by importing produce into their Northern Ontario community. This year, faced with rising food prices and concerns about extreme weather events affecting shipments to their city, the team partnered with a small, independent local grocer, Sunrise Orchards, to create HOME PAILS (Healthy Options Made Easy – Produce Acquired in Local Schools). These pails contain affordable bi-weekly food parcels featuring fresh produce grown in hydroponic towers. The students also work hard to prevent ‘ugly’ produce from becoming food waste and turn it into tasty snacks for their classmates! The HOME PAILS are helping to promote a plant-based diet that is more respectful of the planet, to combat climate change and to combat food insecurity in their community. In the years to come, they hope that their garden will be sufficiently developed to provide fresh apples, pears and berries, and that they will be able to use their school’s solar greenhouse to grow tomatoes and peppers!
RUNNER UP:
Tall Grass Prairie Pollinators Corridor – Linden Meadows School – Winnipeg, MB
Members of the Linden Meadows UNESCO Club in Winnipeg, Manitoba, attended the LSF Youth Forum on Climate Action in March and were inspired by our keynote speakers, students from a local middle school who had embarked on a tallgrass prairie restoration project. Through further research, they discovered the benefits of these natural species, such as acting as carbon sinks, preventing erosion, resisting drought, improving soil quality, attracting pollinators, contributing to biodiversity, buffering against wind and much more! The Linden Meadows team decided to contribute to the restoration of Winnipeg’s natural ecosystem and found a 2′ x 180′ corridor on their school property to establish their tallgrass prairie ecosystem. This project allowed the students to apply their knowledge of biodiversity and ecosystems outside the classroom!
RUNNER UP:
Piloting a Compost Program in an Elementary School – Pacific Way Elementary School – Kamloops, BC
Grade 7 students at Pacific Way Elementary School in Kamloops, British Columbia, came up with a dozen different ideas for their climate Action Project and then voted to choose their favourite. They decided that since their city had recently launched a composting program, their school should too! They started by giving a presentation to the school staff and the district superintendent to explain the importance of diverting compostable materials from the landfill in order to reduce carbon emissions. They also had to get the school’s janitor on board, who told them that the school produced around 17 large bags of garbage every day! Highly motivated by the need to reduce waste, they turned the classroom garbage bins into compost bins and provided only small bins for garbage. They gave a presentation to all the classes in the school and taught them how to compost properly. After just a month, they have reduced their weekly garbage production by more than half! Their next step is to make a presentation to the school district to try to get all the other local schools composting too!
HONOURABLE MENTION:
Paper Towel Free School – Collicutt School – Winnipeg, MB
As an LSF Sustainable Future School, Collicutt School in Winnipeg, Manitoba, has been on the lookout for ways to make their school more sustainable. The grade 2/3 students did some data collection and estimated that each classroom was sending almost 800 paper towels to the landfill every week! The grade 5 students were inspired to join them as sustainability buddies and work together to completely cut out the use of paper towels in the school. After a lot of research and educating the staff and student body, they have switched to reusable cloth towels and hugely reduced their school’s waste production. When the grade 5s move to a new school next year, the younger students will make sure this initiative continues and has a lasting impact!
HONOURABLE MENTION:
Fisher for the Future – Fisher Park Summit Alternative School – Ottawa, ON
The students of Fisher Park Summit Alternative School in Ottawa, Ontario, took action in their community on Sustainable Development Goals #2 – Zero Hunger and #13 – Climate Action. They wanted to take an entrepreneurial approach and create and sell sustainable products to benefit local organizations. After creating their brand “Fisher for the Future” they sourced materials and began manufacturing beeswax wraps, seed paper, and plant starter kits. All profits from their sales went directly to their community through the Ottawa-Carleton Wildlife Center and the Parkdale Food Centre!
HONOURABLE MENTION:
FOY Fights Climate Change – Eco Challenges in Eastern Ontario – Front of Yonge Elementary School – Mallorytown, ON
Front of Yonge Elementary School in Mallorytown, Ontario, has a great food program that, unfortunately, produces quite a bit of waste. Their small school of less than 120 students consumes about 15,000 milk cartons a year, all of which were being sent to landfill. They began the inquiry process to see if their local Waste Disposal Site would partner with their school to take the cartons. They reached out to their local representatives and school administrators and got permission to bypass their school garbage and send their milk cartons to be recycled instead. They made sure to educate the rest of the school on how to properly prepare the cartons for recycling pickup. Not only did they divert the milk carton waste through recycling, but they also up-cycled some to plant seedlings and begin growing pollinator-friendly plants. They also purchased a dishwasher, stainless steel cutlery, and reusable cups to cut down on other single-use items in their snack program! Next they want to encourage all other schools in their board to follow their lead!
HONOURABLE MENTION:
Petit Éco-Centre et Collecte d’Uniforms – Collège Jean-Eudes – Montréal, QC
Collège Jean-Eudes in Montreal, Quebec, set up a school thrift shop a few years ago. They receive and sell a large volume of clothing every week! For their project, they bought bins where community members can sort the items that they are donating. This has made the job easier for the students who work there. They have also found partners to collect school supplies, light bulbs, can pins, batteries, padlocks and small electronic appliances. They hope that the members of their community will bring these items to their Éco-centre rather than sending them to the landfill. They estimate that around 1,500 items have been reused rather than thrown away thanks to their second-hand shop!
HONOURABLE MENTION:
R3USE – Métis Beach School – Métis-sur-Mer, QC
The grade 5-6 students of Métis Beach School from Métis-sur-Mer, Quebec, created a company called R3USE inspired by the 3 Rs -reduce, reuse, recycle – to promote eco-friendly actions and support the bees! Last year, students planted pollinator-friendly plants in the schoolyard, and this fall they collected and saved the seeds and dried the flowers. The R3USE team used these seeds to make seed bombs and seed paper, and the dried flowers to make bookmarks. They sold these products to raise money for future sustainability projects, as well as to raise awareness in their school community and get more people supporting pollinators!
HONOURABLE MENTION:
Taking Care of the Environment – École St. Matthew’s School – St. John’s, NL
The goal of the young students at St. Matthew’s School in St. John’s, Newfoundland, is to become environmental activists who are empowered to fight climate change. They took action through a school grounds clean up, wildflower planting, and setting up an aquaponics system in their classroom. They partnered with local organizations to learn more about growing food and conserving energy in their classroom. For their culminating project, they created a “Student Treasures” storybook book featuring chosen environmental topics from each student to bring home and share with their families!
For more information please contact:
Sam Gawron
samantha@lsf-lst.ca
1 877 250 8202