Progress from a conference: a debrief and what’s next.
On Thursday, Sept 25th, 2025, the four of us– Alana, Bryn, Erin, and Tristan –along with Jessica Asp- attended the three-day Regenerative Futures conference held at Shawnigan Lake School. Students, teachers, staff, indigenous/climate experts, and speakers from BC and beyond joined together to speak up and generate solidarity for action towards a sustainable future.
While we are grateful to have had this opportunity, and wouldn’t trade our time at the conference, there are some things we would change. The conference constantly claimed to prioritize youth and emphasized pairing students with adults. Paradoxically, they primarily structured the conference around older experts presenting and occasionally conversing, while students collaborated in school-specific groups on projects that were then presented to the adults. This made us feel like we were a shiny youth program they wanted to show off, while not truly listening to our voices.
Despite this approach being discouraging for us, we managed to form a plan on how to unite nature with our urban environments and gain connections to other schools and the greater Victoria community.
We want to collaborate with other schools (students and staff) and the community in ways we weren’t able to at the conference. We’re making a community garden in the Greater Victoria downtown area!
Why a garden? Our idea is the result of tracking smaller urban issues– such as urban loneliness, outdoor and communal inaccessibility, and detachment from place –back to a major problem: a severe lack of nature-based community experiences in downtown Victoria. Our community, in terms of greenery, is saying “heal me, my darling”. After some group brainstorming and problem inspection, we decided on our most impactful and realistic project.
The plan we formed at that time was to repurpose areas such as the gravel field (nearby Beacon Hill Park) into a community garden that could both provide environmental education and serve as a place where the other incredible communities of Greater Victoria (for example, our thriving music scene and our local queer community) can engage with in their own unique way. As our plan was only constructed in three days, it wasn’t perfect and is still being refined. Thankfully, we are at an inquiry school, which allows us to approach problems from as many angles as needed and can iterate on our processes as we acquire more information. Our school also empowers us to innovate in our community in ways never before seen. We have already begun expanding our reach beyond our small group, starting to recruit fellow learners and interested community members to begin work on all fronts of this project, and more, to help heal our city.
Our next steps with our revised plan are to reach out wherever we can and find a confirmed location for the first garden. This project will be growing as it goes, but the end goal is the same: a safe green space for everyone’s benefit.