Central High Students Represent VI at UNESCO Global Camp In Denmark

St. Croix Central High School students Akeno Canton and Jayme Colbert-Williams, along with teacher Jesus Espinosa represented the Virgin Islands at the UNESCO: Global Camp 2019 held in Copenhagen and other cities throughout the country, Oct. 26-Nov. 1. The group also participated in local programs at Egaa Gymnasium in Aarhus and Paderup Gymnasium in Randers.

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The camp focuses on the 17 UN Sustainable Goals, bringing students from Ghana, Serbia, South Africa, Spain, Turkey, the USVI and Denmark together to form cooperation and collaboration to effect changes in their local school and wider communities on the goals individually chosen. St. Croix Central High School students chose to develop Goal 13: Climate Action, in an effort to reduce the school’s waste footprint at the local landfill. They will begin with education and advocacy on issues surrounding climate change affecting the Virgin Islands community first, and develop and implement a model recycling program at Central High that can be replicated across the territory’s public and private schools.

“We chose Climate Change goal because we are limited on fresh water and our marine environment is being affected by the things we are doing,” Canton noted.

 

In addition to Goal 13, the students will work with Goal 14: Life in Sea, Goal 15: Life on Land, and Goal 4: Quality Education. 

 

Following completion of the main programming in Copenhagen, the St. Croix team visited their partner school at Egaa Gymnasium in Aarhus. There, they worked to develop Goal 13 with student counterparts who have also chosen the same goal for their school and wider community. The students worked on strategic, collaborative and specific approaches. They also visited Paderup Gymnasium in Randers to collaborate with students there. 

 

Egaa and Paderup Gymnasiums have had collaborations with St. Croix Central High School in previous years. Students and teachers from Paderup visited Central High in January 2019, and Egaa Gymnasium has visited the school twice in the past four years.