2023 - 5th Broward Youth Climate Summit (In-person summit)

The Fifth Annual Broward Youth Climate Summit was held February 10, 2023 (in-person), at Pompano Beach High School, for over 900 BCPS students who attended 42 sessions by experts in the environmental arena. The list of sessions and the agenda can be found at 2023 Youth Climate Summit and Sessions.

As part of this year's summit, a few selected high school students attended the Broward County and the Southeast Florida Regional Climate Change Compact's 14th Annual Southeast Florida Regional Climate Leadership Summit on December 8 and 9, 2022, at the Broward Convention Center. Student attendees at the Regional Climate Change Compact Summit below.

2022 - 4th Broward Youth Climate Summit (Virtual and in-person summit)

The Fourth Annual Broward Youth Climate Summit was held virtually on March 9-10 and in-person on April 20, 2022 at the Museum of Discovery and Science (MODS). The theme for this year was "Climate Change, Climate Justice" and keynote speakers at the virtual summit included Rachel Sarah, author of Girl Warriors: How 25 Young Activists Are Saving the Earth, Hannah Testa, and Daphne Frias, student activists featured in the book, and Neela Banerjee, Supervising Climate Editor of NPR. Closing keynote speaker AY Young, producer, singer, songwriter, entertainer, and entrepreneur. AY is one of the first artists to power his concerts with 100% renewable energy. The 2022 Virtual Broward Youth Climate Summit Program (for the public) can be found at https://bit.ly/2022BrowardYouthClimateSummitProgram 

Students who participated in the in-person summit at MODS on April 20 completed their Climate Action Plans and learned how to effectively communicate their ideas. Sessions included The Power of Social Media, The Underwater: Using Socially Engaged Art to Tackle Sea-Level Rise, Harnessing the Power of Your Voice in the Climate Movement, Community-Centered Action: Utilizing the Three Lenses of Sustainability, Creating Emotional Attachments through Digital Media, Changing Our Florida Constitution to Include the Rights to Clean Water, Meteorology, Using Debate to Advance the Climate Action Plan, and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Infographic Posters. Details can be found at 2022 Fourth Annual Broward Youth Climate Summit (MODS program)

Watch students in action at this year's summit at https://twitter.com/i/status/1517561966570749954

Picture shown here: Superintendent Cartwright with Walter C Young Middle School students Sebastian Quintana (left) and Lyndan Williams (right) at the in-person summit at MODS.

Virtual 2-Day Summit Speakers:

 Downloadable 2022 Broward Youth Climate Summit flyer

Rising Waters Art Project at BCPS - November 1-5, 2021 to showcase unique art installations at schools throughout the District in support of the Youth Climate Summit. Rising Waters is a conceptual art project that raises awareness about the impact of climate change to local communities by highlighting future possible flood levels resulting from sea-level rise and storm conditions. The colorful installation artwork provides a visual representation of the potential future by highlighting water at ankle, knee, hip, or eye level. For more information, visit the Rising Waters Art Project at BCPS page.

2021 - 3rd Broward Youth Climate Summit (A 3-day virtual summit)

The Third Annual Broward Youth Climate Summit was held virtually on March 9-11, 2021.  Students who attended the Summit had the opportunity to learn from youth and experts on the global climate change challenge, its regional implications, and local actions everyone can take to address the challenge. Keynote Speakers for March 9: Renowned astrophysicist Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson, comedian Chuck Nice, and climatologist Dr. Gavin Schmidt! There was a special Cosmic Queries episode of StarTalk exclusively for Broward Youth Climate Summit participants. We had other incredible keynote speakers for March 10 and 11 as well! 2021 Youth Climate Summit program (public)

2020 - 2nd Broward Youth Climate Summit

The Second Broward Youth Climate Summit was held on January 10, 2020 at the Museum of Discovery and Science with the theme of Sea Level Rise.  Over 800 BCPS middle and high school students attended this incredible summit and were amazed at the different breakout sessions they attended.  Sessions included Engineering, Law/Debate, Politics/Civic, Government/Planning/Traffic/Utilities, Economics/Finance/Insurance/Real Estate, Arts/Entertainment, Communication/Media, Social/Human Services, and Technology/Science (Bio/Ecology). Media coverage of this event can be found at:

• CBS: https://miami.cbslocal.com/2020/01/10/watch-broward-youth-climate-summit-sea-level-rise/
• Sun Sentinel: https://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/schools/fl-ne-youth-climate-summit-20200110-bki43rnfvnbrhfjqz4avmifpny-story.html
• WLRN: https://wlrn.us/36KPR1w
• NBC6: https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/climate-change-center-of-conversation-at-broward-youth-summit/2175710/
• Invading Seas: https://www.theinvadingsea.com/2020/01/02/broward-schools-climate-summit-designed-to-help-students-understand-climate-challenges-and-how-to-address-them/

2019 - First Broward Youth Climate Summit

BCPS middle and high school students attended the inaugural Broward Youth Climate Summit on January 25th, 2019 at the Global Events Center in Fort Lauderdale.  The Youth Climate Summit provided a platform for students to advocate for policy change and gives students a voice for promoting environmental sustainability.  Students who attended the Summit shared their climate action plans or projects and networked with each other, elected officials and scientists working on sustainability issues.

The event was held in collaboration with the Broward County Environmental Planning and Community Resilience Division.

For more info, contact browardstem@browardschools.com

Watch students interact with each other and the panelists from BECON's production: https://eduvision.tv/l?egAmDA 

2023 - The Fifth Broward Youth Climate Summit program can be downloaded here and for details on the sessions, via Canvas.

2022 - The Fourth Broward Youth Climate Summit programs can be accessed via Canvas (virtual summit) and downloadable in-person program here.

2021 - The Third Broward Youth Climate Summit program can be accessed via Canvas.

2020 - The Second Broward Youth Climate Summit on January 10, 2020 was well attended by over 800 middle and high school students at the Museum of Discovery and Science.

To access the event schedule, session descriptions, and supporters, download here.

Pictured below (L-R): Superintendent Runcie, Susan Cantrick, Beam Furr, Hector Ponte, Heather Brinkworth, Noah Vlenstein, Joseph P. Cox. Picture from the Museum of Discovery and Science and Michael Murphy.

2019 - The inaugural Broward Youth Climate Summit was an exciting, successful event for the more than 400 middle and high school students who attended.  Amongst the event activity was a group project where students added their names - see picture below. 

To access the event schedule, speaker bios and supporters, download the program here

The Broward Youth Climate Summit is open to all traditional public Broward County Public School students in grades 5-12. 

Registration is closed for the 2022-23 summit.

Participating classes must create a poster or banner that reflects the theme of this year's summit: I Am the Change: Connect, Commit, Act!

Download the 2023 YCS flyer and poster/banner requirement.

Broward County Public Schools, through its Applied Learning Department, is partnering with Rising Waters to showcase unique art installations at 18 schools throughout the District and the District office. Rising Waters is a conceptual art project that raises awareness about the impact of climate change to local communities by highlighting future possible flood levels resulting from sea-level rise and storm conditions. The colorful installation artwork provides a visual representation of the potential future by highlighting water at ankle, knee, hip, or eye level.

In addition to installing the sea-level rise artwork, students are also placing hand-made fish flags on campus with their action step for helping mitigate the impact of climate change.

See the entire project at https://www.browardschools.com/Page/66023. 

Resources:

• Broward County's Climate, Energy & Sustainability Program

• Broward County’s Climate Change Website

• Broward County's Climate Action Plan

• 2020 Climate Action Plan Questionnaire. Theme: Sea Level Rise
• Volunteering at a Water Way Clean-Up:
  
  • https://waterwaycleanup.org/
• Global Citizens on the Environment - Impact of climate change on the world’s poorest people. This organization encourages people to become global citizens and take action.
  • 23 Million Pounds of Plastic Removed From Beaches in Unprecedented Cleanup
  • 10 worst single-use plastics and eco-friendly alternatives
    
    
• Climate Gentrification - Presentation by Maya Gowda & Emily Vo
  
  
• Top 10 Eco-friendly Substitutes for Plastic
  
  
• Fridays for Future - is a global climate strike movement that started in August 2018, when 15-year-old Greta Thunberg began a school strike for climate. 
  

• Rising Waters Project Based Lessons (PBL)

  • https://www.risingwaters.org/#/broward-county-1/ 

  • https://www.broward.org/climate/Pages/default.aspx

• Article: What do Florida public school students learn about climate change? 

2022 4th Annual Youth Climate Summit Artwork Winners

2021 3rd Annual Youth Climate Summit Artwork winner

Rem Crespo, Cypress Bay High School

2021 2nd Annual Youth Climate Summit Artwork winner

Amanda Moran, Cypress Bay High School

Third Annual Broward Youth Climate Summit (2020-21) - The Broward Youth Climate Task Force was created to provide Broward County Public School students a voice for promoting environmental sustainability and contributing to the updated 2020-25 Broward County Climate Action Plan. This group researched their issues, met with Commissioner Beam Furr, and sent out tweets to further explore ways of informing the public and solving plastic pollution and climate gentrification.

The main issues the task force targeted were:

1. Plastic Pollution/Recycling - Plastic pollution is harmful to the animals and the environment.  Most plastic straws are not biodegradable and cannot be broken down naturally by bacteria and other decomposers into non-toxic materials. Most plastic straws simply break into ever-smaller particles, releasing chemicals into the soil, air, and water that are harmful to animals, plants, people, and the environment. How can we encourage businesses and the general population to reduce or eliminate the use of single-use plastic such as plastic straws? We should also address the recycling (or lack of) of plastics in Broward County.  
   
   
2. Climate Gentrification - a relatively new term describing what happens when neighborhoods traditionally overlooked by wealthy people become more attractive—and expensive—given their siting in geographic areas that happen to be more resilient to climate-related threats such as stronger, more frequent hurricanes and rising sea levels. How is this affecting Broward County?

Resources on the above issues: constantly updated

• Broward County's Climate, Energy & Sustainability Program
  
  
• Volunteering at a Water Way Clean-Up:
  
  • https://waterwaycleanup.org/ 
• Global Citizens on the Environment - Impact of climate change on the world’s poorest people. This organization encourages people to become global citizens and take action.
  • 23 Million Pounds of Plastic Removed From Beaches in Unprecedented Cleanup
  • 10 worst single-use plastics and eco-friendly alternatives

• Climate Gentrification - Presentation by Maya Gowda & Emily Vo
  
  
• Fridays for Future - is a global climate strike movement that started in August 2018, when 15-year-old Greta Thunberg began a school strike for climate. 
  
  
• Top 10 Eco-friendly Substitutes for Plastic

Members:

Alvin V. - Junior, Miramar High School
"I joined this initiative to bring awareness to the many environmental disruptions that exist in our community".

Emily V. - Senior, Coral Springs High School 
"I joined the Youth Climate Task Force because I am passionate about climate justice and advocating for equitable solutions!" 

 

Krisztina T. - Beachside Montessori 
"I have always been passionate about nature and our part in taking care of Earth. Being involved in the Youth Climate Summit is a very exciting experience, and I hope that we can bring awareness and change to some of the most pressing climate issues."

Khushi D. - Deerfield Beach HS
"I want my voice as a youth to be heard to make a positive and long lasting impact on the world"

Shrishon K. - Sophomore, Miramar High School
“I love science and care for the environment, striving to fix the diverse climate problems one bottle at a time!”

Zoe B. - Senior, Stoneman Douglas High School
"I joined the youth climate change task force because I am passionate about doing my part to fix the environment before the damage is irreversible. I am so excited to be a part of this group and do my part while I’m still in high school."

2023 Fifth Broward Youth Climate Summit

Thank you to all of our generous sponsors that made the Fifth Annual Broward Youth Climate Summit a  success!

2021 Broward Youth Climate Summit Sponsors

    

2021 Broward Youth Climate Summit

Thank you to the following sponsors for your support of this year's summit!

                      

2020 Second Annual Broward Youth Climate Summit

Second Annual Broward Youth Climate Summit Sponsors:  Thank you to all our sponsors for their generous support!

     

Thank you to all of our 2018-19 generous sponsors for making this event a successful one.

            

MISSION 

To convene, engage, connect, and empower young people for action on climate change in South Florida through the Youth Climate Summit and other leadership opportunities, and to create a climate literate generation who:  

• Understands the essential principles of climate science
• Communicates about climate and climate change in a meaningful way
• Makes informed and responsible decisions with regard to actions that may affect climate
• Takes action on promoting and implementing climate change adaptation and resilience measures in their homes, schools, and communities
  
  

2021-22 Broward Youth Climate Summit Committee:

BCPS Applied Learning Department

Broward County Natural Resources Division

The Museum of Discovery and Science