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British Council's International Climate Champion programme is a global project which aims to support young people who are committed to action on climate change. These young people, known as International Climate Champions (ICCs), develop and implement projects within their communities to raise awareness of climate change. ICCs also work with other young people around the globe to share their ideas and collaborate on large scale projects. In 2008, there were over 800 ICCs in 29 countries. In 2009, the programme expanded to include 1000 ICCs in 30 countries.
In 2008, a project was launched by the Canadian Climate Champions called ICCommit, a climate change education presentation given to elementary and secondary schools throughout Canada. The goal of this presentation was to inspire students to make an eco-friendly pledge for one week, December 1st to 8th 2008. The students who made the pledge were given a green ICCommit bracelet as a reminder of their commitment to living greener and more sustainably. Pledges were posted at the schools and on the ICCommit website.
In its first year the ICCommit program was very successful being run in more than twenty schools across Canada in four provinces: Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia and Manitoba. ICCommit was also able to go global being run in a Cape Farewell school in Lucknow, India as well as launched in schools in California, USA. In total, over 15,000 bracelets were distributed to students who made one pledge to lighten their impact on the environment. The hope of this one pledge is that students will realize that living environmentally friendly is very simple and eventually make a green lifestyle shift one pledge at a time.
ICCommit is being continued and expanded in 2009.
For more information, visit British Council.
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