By Saozinha | Graduate, Environmental Leaders Online
Dear donors,
We thought you´d like to hear from one of our Environmental Leaders - so here she is!
My name is Maria da Conceição and everyone calls me Sãozinha. I like to describe myself as a NGI - non government individual. I´m also an ecowarrior. And I live in Belo Horizonte, the state capital.
I´m trained as a sociologist and I´ve done a lot of different jobs in my life. I was a town councilor, I worked in the Catholic Church, and latterly I worked as a consultant to the local Water Board, and was especially interested in their program to protect water sources. Like the program you have at Iracambi.
Then I left that - it was a political appointment and the administration changed. And, around 2004 I got interested in urban agriculture. Seventeen years ago. I started thinking about how people could grow food on empty lots, even in window boxes - check out the plants on my veranda. I started growing plants and giving them away, to encourage people. I've always been interested in learning. I did a course on agroecology given by the county government. And then I became an environmental agent and got interested in environmental leadership.
You'll laugh - I used to encourage my friends to learn about environmental leadership, but I never got round to studying it myself. Until I found your course online, and I thought it looked interesting. So I checked out your site and then I signed up. And I got really interested. I`d like to visit when covid allows.
When I joined the first class I saw there were people of all ages and all parts of Brazil, and I thought that was great. I wanted to hear new ideas from new friends. And during the course my group decided to work with cinema, showing films in schools and in public spaces - to arouse interest about nature. Spreading the word. And people really enjoy it. I think we're sowing the seeds and we´ll reap a harvest of environmental leaders.
And since we´re talking to you, dear donors, I just want to thank you for your support. You are doing something really important because the world needs environmental leaders now more than ever. Potential leaders are everywhere, and, as leaders ourselves, we need to work together, think outside the box, identify the problems one at a time and work together to find solutions.
That´s how we´ll change the world.
with love,
Sãozinha (Environmental Leader)
By Binka Le Breton | Project Leader
By Binka Le Breton | Project Leader
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