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You
are here: Seattle Students and Facing the Future in China
by Wendy Church
This summer (July 2005) Facing the Future's ecological footprint activity was taught by Seattle teens to Chinese youth during their travel program to China. The travel program served low income and minority students from Seattle's Cleveland, Franklin, Ingraham, Garfield, and Roosevelt high schools.
The American students traveled to China as part of a joint program run by One World Now (OWN) and Pacific Village Institute (PVI). OWN is a Seattle-based global leadership program for high school juniors and PVI connects global citizens through cultural immersion, community service, and collaborative projects in the developing countries of Asia.
During their 3-week visit to China, the American students taught Facing the Future lessons on ecological footprint to students at Global Village Beijing, a Chinese non-profit organization dedicated to environmental education and civil society strengthening, as well as to Chinese students from a local high school.
American and Chinese students work together on Facing the Future's Ecological Footprint activity in a village outside of Beijing.
Prior to departure to China, the American students participated in a workshop with Facing the Future staff that prepared them to teach the Facing the Future lessons on ecological footprint to students in China.
An Ecological Footprint is the area of the earth's productive surface that it takes to produce the goods and services necessary to support a person's lifestyle. For example, the average American's ecological footprint is 23.6 acres/person; the average Chinese ecological footprint is 3.8 acres/person (Living Planet Report, 2002). Facing the Future's standards-based lessons around this concept engage students and allow them to relate their class work to their everyday activities.
Students create posters of products they often use, and brainstorm together all the resources and processes that go into their production.
A student wrote this reflection after doing the Facing the Future activity in preparation for teaching it to students in China:
I imagine the ecological footprint of the Chinese will only increase in size. There are already groups organizing against pollution, as there are here in the United States, which is good, because they are recognizing the environmental problem; however, the fact that there even needs to be protest to the pollution is a sign of a larger ecological footprint and change in the lifestyle of the Chinese. In many ways, and to many Chinese people, the change is good; there are equal opportunities for all people. However, the impact on the earth due to this upcoming change could be disastrous. The Western lifestyle is wasteful, and with more and more countries, especially China, the most populated country in the world, being westernized, there won't be enough natural resources to go around. This could lead to war and destruction. Do you think the Westernization of China is worth the cost of the environment?
In the process, the American and Chinese students not only learned about ecological footprints and ways to lessen their impacts on the earth, but shared examples of daily rituals that define their respective lifestyles -- what they eat, how they cook, what kind of transportation they use, the source of the clothing they wear and products they buy, how often they bathe, how big their houses are, and so on.
Wendy Church, Ph.D. is the Executive Director for Facing the Future: People and the Planet. She is co-author of two textbooks, It's All Connected: A Comprehensive Guide to Global Issues and Sustainable Solutions, and Global Issues and Sustainable Solutions: Population, Poverty, Consumption, Conflict, and the Environment. Both of these texts can be previewed online at www.facingthefuture.org. Wendy has worked, lived and traveled extensively in Europe, Japan, and the Middle East, and has worked in both non-profit organizations and for-profit business. Wendy holds a B.S. in Engineering from the University of Washington, a Masters of Management from Northwestern University's Kellogg Graduate School of Management, and a Ph.D. in BioResource Engineering from Oregon State University.
Wendy Church, Ph.D.
Executive Director
Facing the Future: People and the Planet
811 First Ave., Suite 454
Seattle, WA 98104
(phone) 206-264-1503 (fax) 206-264-1506
wendy@facingthefuture.org
©January 2006 New Horizons for Learning
http://www.newhorizons.org
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