By: Anne Tamayo and Yaminah Veloso
Looking to make a difference in your community while learning more about the Earth’s changing climate? Every term, EarthWorks––a Capilano University (CapU) initiative––hosts a series of events relating to environmental topics. The initiative started as a collaboration of staff and students across faculty who wanted to educate their community on environmental issues and processes.
EarthWorks started as a collaboration of staff and students across faculty with a desire to instill knowledge and initiative in students, members of campus, and the community about environmental processes and issues through a multidisciplinary approach. Through holding a series of events, such as workshops, tours, and restoration outreach, EarthWorks strives to encourage its participants to participate in its goal of positive transformational change in our local community.
The initiative progresses towards its mission and goals through partnerships with local climate and ecological activists in the workshops it holds for students throughout the term. EarthWorks presents students and participants with a co-curricular credit and an EarthWorks notation on transcript incentive for participating in three lectures, an environmental restoration event, and volunteer work.
Types of Events:
EarthWorks events cover a variety of engaging environmental topics and activities, from immersive arts and educational workshops, thought-provoking film screenings and hands-on activities like invasive plant pulls.
Art Workshops:
Some of the previous guests of EarthWorks’ educational art workshops were visual ecologists Aviva Reed and Rachel Verity Foster. Reed’s workshop begins by exploring the concepts of ecology and art, followed by a watercolour session, to tap into the world of soil, water, weather and time. In doing so, Reed hopes to unlock participants’ ecological imagination, where they can envision the visible and invisible processes that may help develop more livable futures.
Similarly, Foster guides participants in creating lumen prints using local ecological material. Amid this artistic journey, the workshop dives into the concepts of biocultural memories, birdsong mapping, and the role of soil in local ecosystems. Through these teachings, Foster fulfills her mission of spreading awareness of the global decline of wildlife populations, a fatal consequence of our large-scale intrusion on natural surroundings and its processes.
Film Screenings:
Of course, one can’t speak of art without mentioning film! EarthWorks’ has held screenings featuring the documentary films Let Them Eat Dirt: The Hunt For Our Kids’ Missing Microbes by Bullfrog Films and The Soul of the Fraser by Brendan Chu and Chris Jenkins.
Let Them Eat Dirt is based on the book Let Them Eat Dirt by B. Brett Finlay and Marie-Claire Arrieta. It digs into the relationship between our modern lifestyle and microbial ecosystems, and how this connection affects our health, particularly in causing or preventing diseases like asthma and diabetes.
Meanwhile, The Soul of the Fraser explores the rocky future of the Fraser River’s estuary, a tragic consequence of continuous property development despite the estuary’s highly vulnerable ecosystems.
Educational workshops and guided tours:
Along with the Truth and Reconciliation Learning Circle, EarthWorks participants were invited to join CapU’s Alumni Association and the Wild Bird Trust of BC for a tour of the conservation area at Maplewood Flats in North Vancouver. While touring this bird and wildlife sanctuary, participants learned about its traditional ethnobotany, its local birds, and the deep connection it holds to the SəỈílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) people.
One previous workshop was hosted by Josh Wallace, the winner of the 2019 Canadian Architect Student Award of Excellence for his Master of Architecture thesis, “Listening to Climate Change.” His workshop centres on the connection between climate change and human consciousness. Wallace guides listeners through audio recordings and graphic representations of melting glaciers, having them ponder over how the unique sounds of these frozen entities are disappearing due to climate change. Through his work, participants are encouraged to reimagine and reassess our connection to the planet and engage their senses to the disastrous environmental changes.
In another informative workshop, EarthWorks coordinator Hojat Yozdan Panah navigates participants through the basics of Geographic Information System (GIS). GIS is a computer system that analyzes and exhibits georeferenced data, which helps in envisioning and developing problem-solving decisions.
Gardening and Active Action
Taking a break from all the learning, EarthWorks also springs into sustainable action by hosting gardening activities throughout the term. Its most recent events have been Soil Week at CapU and Ecological Restoration––Invasive Plant Pull. During Soil Week, EarthWorks members and event participants helped place soil into the university’s community garden, preparing the area for its anticipated plant growth while celebrating the arrival of spring. This was shortly followed by Ecological Restoration Day, where participants helped to restore the campus’ biological integrity, tugging out invasive plants like English ivy, periwinkle, Himalayan blackberry, and more.
Interested in contributing for a change this summer? Click here for upcoming events or contact the EarthWorks coordinators, Nancy van Groll at nancyvangroll@capilanou.ca
or Cheryl Schreader at cschreader@capilanou.ca to learn more!
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