To launch a school-wide identity project, behavior interventionist Connor Umsted shared his own "identity poem" with fellow staff members at Frederick H. Tuttle Middle School, in South Burlington VT.

Full transcript: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1aAoZ99IEGYMQpj8bIYdwpJWHPFXz4L59xsckaVMWmcA/edit

Integrating food studies into schools leads to thinking about interconnectedness in other ares of study. But don't take my word for it: meet some amazing students from The Cornwall School, in Cornwall VT, who definitely won't be surviving on Pop Tarts, ramen or mac and cheese when they grow up.

Our theme music is, as always, by dirtwire. Additional music in this episode appears courtesy Diana Gruber, Kabbalistic Village, and Nicolai Heidlas. Thank you, as always, for listening.

Integrating food studies into schools leads to thinking about interconnectedness in other ares of study. But don't take my word for it: meet some amazing students from The Cornwall School, in Cornwall VT, who definitely won't be surviving on Pop Tarts, ramen or mac and cheese when they grow up.

"My favorite root vegetable is probably the beet because you can do so many fun things with it. In a beet salad, you usually have thinly sliced beets with some Feta cheese on it, and sometimes, you’ll add some brussels sprouts or something, like maybe a hard-boiled egg or two on top. Another great thing to do with beets is to put it on a pizza, so pizza crust with a little Maple syrup on top with beets, Feta cheese on it."

What do the Global Goals look sound like in action?

The three Essex Middle School students who delivered the keynote address at the 2nd annual Cultivating Pathways to Sustainability conference spoke from the heart. They also spoke from experience, having spent the previous year using the #GlobalGoals to address hunger in their communities.

A full transcript appears below.

On this episode of The 21st Century Classroom:

Yeah, I feel like a lot of people will just look at the goals and be like, "Oh, that's great." But actually being able to do something about it and share that and, hopefully, inspire other people is really good.

We meet three amazing middle schoolers who are using their learning -- and their voices -- to bring global change to their community.

In 2015, the United Nations introduced 17 Sustainable Development Goals, goals they believe that, if met by 2030, have the potential to end all forms of poverty, fight inequalities and tackle climate change. Those are some lofty goals for the planet, but here in Vermont, educators and students are embracing that challenge.

An amazing day at Cultivating Pathways to Sustainability #vtcps . We left with a goal: to create equitable access to recreational resources in our community. Excited to find some community partners to work with! #mansfieldcoop @shelburnefarms

A post shared by Mansfield Cooperative School (@mansfieldcooperative) on Sep 21, 2017 at 11:03am PDT

Last year, Essex Middle School educator Lindsey Halman and Peoples Academy High School teacher Kate Toland organized a statewide conference to provide space and structure for students to explore school-based projects that work towards one of the 17 Sustainable Goals.

Lindsey: My name is Lindsey Halman. I’m a middle grade educator at Essex Middle School.

I think it was now, about two and a half years ago, myself and Kate Toland, who is a high school teacher at Peoples Academy, and Jen Cirillo at Shelburne Farms. We had a meeting of the minds.

We kind of cooked up this concept of what would happen if we had youth come with an adult partner to think about these goals and what they could do in their own school communities to make change.

https://youtu.be/wItzt4t--Ms

 

Thus, Cultivating Pathways to Sustainability was born.

At that first conference, 80 students from 8 different schools showed up. They opened their minds to one idea: that they could use a specific framework of global pathways to guide them in making concrete change in their own communities.

 

This year, the conference nearly doubled. 120 students from 13 schools attended. And the conference opened with a pretty amazing keynote performance: slam poetry and testimonials from three Essex Middle School students.

Abby, Marie and Raquel are three students at Essex Middle School who took part in last year’s conference and then used the Sustainable Development Goals as a framework for undertaking personally meaningful projects that they hoped would better their own communities.

We spoke with these three to hear a little more about their projects, and what the Sustainable Goals meant to them.

Abby and the Bags of Hope

From Abby's keynote at the conference: 

"So, I was at the conference last year and I had no idea what I wanted to do for my year-long project. So my goal was to create a system for food-insecure families to have access to healthy snacks over the weekend. Because many students rely on school for breakfast and lunch.

We called my project Bags of Hope and I created re-purposed bags for students to use for healthy snacks.

The three Essex Middle School students who delivered the keynote address at the 2nd annual Cultivating Pathways to Sustainability conference spoke from the heart. They also spoke from experience, having spent the previous year using the #GlobalGoals to address hunger in their communities.

A full transcript of this episode is available at this link: https://wp.me/p4r2oE-3H3

Londonderry, VT-based non-profit The Collaborative is in its 14th year of "Refuse to Use", a substance abuse-prevention program that creates community conversations about alcohol, tobacco and drugs. They base their curriculum off hyper-regional data and depend on community members -- parents, educators and students -- telling them what to talk about next.

Londonderry, VT-based non-profit The Collaborative is in its 14th year of "Refuse to Use", a substance abuse-prevention program that creates community conversations about alcohol, tobacco and drugs. They base their curriculum off hyper-regional data and depend on community members -- parents, educators and students -- telling them what to talk about next.

Full transcript: http://tiie.w3.uvm.edu/blog/refuse-to-use/

Photo by Famartin - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=62467207

At the Queer Straight Alliance (QSA) at Crossett Brook Middle School in Duxbury, Vermont, young adolescents have carved out a space where they can be their authentic selves. While that's critical during middle school, it's especially crucial for LGBTQ students. As we kick off the third season of our podcast, let's hear more about Crossett Brook's QSA by listening to one of the students instrumental in its formation, as well as some of the educators who support them.

At the Queer-Straight Alliance (QSA) at Crossett Brook Middle School in Duxbury, Vermont, young adolescents have carved out a space where they can be their authentic selves. While that's critical during middle school, it's especially crucial for LGBTQ students.

As we kick off the third season of our podcast, let's hear more about Crossett Brook's QSA by listening to one of the students instrumental in its formation, as well as some of the educators who support them.

Remember when you were first starting out as an educator? The ink on your certification barely dried, and there you were, standing in front of your first class, 30-some pairs of eyeballs staring back at you, waiting for you to lead.

We hear from six amazing middle level educators graduating this spring from the University of Vermont. We ask them about their hopes, their fears, and… what their middle school selves would come back to tell them.