The weekend of Nov. 19 – 21 brought together student unions from post-secondary institutions across B.C. to hear from leading experts in climate action to finalize demands they would like to see adopted by the government. The event was hosted by the Alliance of B.C. Students (ABCS), a group of student leaders from five different student unions in B.C. who advocate for student’s rights at the provincial level.
According to Hassan Merali, director of communications for ABCS: “The goal of the summit is to bring students together to explore what we can do together as B.C. post-secondary students, and take a united stand on the climate crisis by presenting a set of demands to the government.”
The Summit featured guest speakers like Paul Finch, treasurer of the British Columbia General Employees’ Union who spoke about divestment, which means removing any investments from your portfolio that are morally and ethically questionable. This term often refers to taking funds away from the fossil fuel industry.
Another guest speaker was Shy-Anne “Strawberry” Gunville, a disabled Afro-Indigenous-Irish land defender who has been on the front lines of the Fairy Creek Protests for months in the fight against the deforestation of old-growth forests. Gunville has been assaulted and arrested multiple times by the RCMP for participating in these protests. She led a workshop on hands-on environmental activism.
The keynote speech was made by Clayton Thomas-Müller, an Indigenous rights, environmental, and economic justice activist and writer. Earlier that day, Müller had been at a protest in support of the Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs in Winnipeg and passionately spoke on how we should actively fight against the encroachment of fossil fuel industries into territories of Indigenous peoples around the world.
“White supremacy and systemic racism enables climate injustice,” said Müller.
“You should do sustainable things — buy secondhand, use energy-efficient light bulbs, recycle — you should do those good things that consumer-based environmentalism allows you to do if you have that privilege,” said Müller. “A lot of the environmentalism is very classist and is inaccessible for people who are cash-poor, for people who don’t have economic privilege.”
The set of demands that were workshopped and revised by the student attendees were:
Demand 1: “That the provincial government, within one year, require that all public post-secondary institutions fully divest from fossil fuels by 2025.”
Demand 2: “We demand that each public post-secondary institution:
- Stop providing training and education specific to the construction and maintenance of fossil fuel infrastructure, and develop new training and education to support the province’s transition to greener energy;
- Provide support to workers transitioning out of the expiring fossil fuel sector, including financial support for re-training and relocation;
- Reject all sponsorship, grant, and scholarship funding from fossil fuel companies; and
- Modernize the curriculum across all program areas to embed opportunities to advance the mitigation of climate change.”
Demand 3: “Each public post-secondary institution publicly state that they will not, now or in the future, be a party to investment in pipelines and fossil fuel infrastructure.”
Demand 4: “We demand that:
- British Columbia stop all extractive resource projects, such as old growth logging, that have not received the free, prior, and informed consent of the host nations;
- That the province privilege the agency of the host nations in decisions around resource projects on their lands
- That the province and the RCMP immediately stop the violent arrest of land and water defenders
Demand 5: “That the University Act be amended to ensure that each public post-secondary institution has, on its board of governors, reserved seats for the host nations on whose land the post-secondary institution operates.”
Andrea Sadowski is working towards her BA in Global Development Studies, with a minor in anthropology and Mennonite studies. When she's not sitting in front of her computer, Andrea enjoys climbing mountains, sleeping outside, cooking delicious plant-based food, talking to animals, and dismantling the patriarchy.
