Are you concerned with COP26?: Just six people attend CCCU Climate Campaign
Just six people attended CCCU’s Climate Change Campaign.
The event was organised by the university and took place outside the new Verena Holmes Building.
In the name of COP26, the event aimed to raise awareness for the ‘Climate Campaign’.
COP26 is a conference where many world leaders have joined together to discuss how to tackle the climate crisis. There is also a summit happening in Scotland right now.
Facilities and organisations such as schools and workplaces across the UK have recently been standing in solidarity with COP26 by making signs and doing marches with the community to raise awareness of the ‘climate campaign’ and urging world leaders to act at this conference.
What did the organiser have to say about this day of action?
It only seemed logical for Canterbury Christ Church University (CCCU) to get involved with showing support for COP26 and calling on world leaders, and the community, to act on protecting the climate.
Organiser Zulfi Ali is a tutor of Social Justice, Sustainability and Human Rights at CCCU.
He was disappointed to only find six people attend this Climate Campaign.
We want to raise awareness on campus about COP26, climate change and just how difficult the situation is and how everyone needs to get involved, raise their voices and demand change.
Zulfi Ali – Social Justice, Sustainability and Human Rights Lecturer
Speaking about climate justice, Ali says that he believes that the issue is much more ‘pressing and urgent’ on the campus of CCCU as students and staff don’t seem to be involved in the big issues such as climate change.
The lecturer asks the question: “What is the point in education if theres 20,000 people on this campus and we can’t get 10 people to come and mark the COP26 day of action. What are we doing on this campus, why is there no gathering of students, why aren’t we talking about it in our lectures and seminars?”
Are the students of CCCU conscious of the climate despite the lack of attention on the COP26 day of action?
Student Union President, Dan Bichener attended the event today.
He too expressed his disappointed in the lack of attention to this event on campus, saying “it’s a shame, but you can’t blame students and lecturers, they have other things going on”.
We need to work together to bring action and come on campaigns like this. It would be really good to see a lot more students join us because you want to be listened to.
Dan Bichener – Student Union President
Dan is confident that the students of CCCU are conscious of the climate. He believes that they do make an effort to use refillable bottles, and are conscious about using plastics.
The President also blames a lack of advertising on the event, believing not a lot of students were actually aware of this day of action. But he remains hopeful that a lot more students will be aware and will turn up to the next possible event.
