Implement climate protection measures in schools

An exciting summer comes to an end at the Müggelsee in Berlin Treptow-Köpenick. Over the past few weeks, participants in the Berlin Cosmopolitan School holiday program have combined leisure and sport in nature and learned a lot about nature at the same time. On August 27, 2021, the Berlin Cosmopolitan School will celebrate these experiences with everyone who is interested. But not only that, the festival should give the starting signal for the first climate-neutral educational institution in Berlin. At 3 p.m., a citizens’ consultation hour with local politicians on the subject is planned.

The way to climate neutrality is via the municipality, in this case the municipality of Köpenick in Berlin. A climate-neutral educational institution is to be created here, because the path to the energy transition in accordance with Agenda 21 and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) defined by the UN takes place via schools and educational institutions. They are among the major CO2 emitters in the municipalities, so that they could have a direct impact on educational institutions with regard to climate change. But that’s not the only reason why schools and educational institutions are key institutions for anchoring the topic of climate neutrality in society: through the students, the conversion of schools to more climate neutrality has a positive effect on families and on society as a whole, because they carry the knowledge out into the world.

The Berlin Cosmopolitan School takes the approach that students must regularly gain primary experiences in nature so that they become fully aware of their environment in order to protect it. For more than 15 years, the school has therefore been taking the students out into nature and into the school’s own forest on a regular basis.

Now the Berlin Cosmopolitan School, in partnership with the Hotel Müggelsee, would like to create a new, forward-looking educational facility with integrated CO2-neutral work opportunities for parents. The project aims to achieve climate neutrality within the next five years through various measures. The planned measures include: reducing CO2 emissions by saving electricity, more conscious heating, getting rid of the parents’ taxi and the teacher’s car, introducing a primarily vegetarian meal plan, using renewable energies to generate CO2-neutral energy, returning the site ( e.g. parking spaces) in the natural environment and CO2 compensation of the unavoidable CO2 emissions through charitable climate projects.

Yvonne Wende, founder and director of the Berlin Cosmopolitan School, reports from her own experience: “Children and young people who, as part of their teaching assignment, deal intensively with the climate neutrality of their educational institution and also get to know a lot of nature-based lessons, will become aware of the effects of their actions on the environment, greenhouse gases and climate change. They start to act carbon neutral and this has an effect on those around them like friends and family.” This awareness should also be increased for parents through the green, CO2-neutral workplace on site. By working closely to achieve climate neutrality plans, the new educational facility at Müggelsee will bring about change and contribute to the government’s major goal of counteracting climate change. Climate neutrality starts with the community, often even with the individual person and makes the difference for everyone.

Location:

Hotel Müggelsee
Müggelheimer Damm 145
12559 Berlin Koepenick

Program – nature as an adventure space:

• Citizen consultation hours
• Ruben von Treeck, fish ecologist at the Leibniz Institute for Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries, clearly explains ecological aspects of water protection
• hydrotherapy
• Herb garden
• mindfulness
• silent walking
• movement
• tree hug
• Walking barefoot and balancing
• Flowering landscapes
• deadwood storage
• singing
• Soccer & Movement

Contact:

Berlin Cosmopolitan School
Rückerstrasse 9
10119 Berlin
mail@cosmopolitanschool.de
030 688 33 23 20