Session

Last spring, John Abbott College (Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, Quebec) launched a Land-Based Learning project, which braids together Indigenous Knowledge and Western science through the lens of two-eyed seeing and in the context of the Climate and Ecological Emergency. It consists of two parts joined together in a cohesive unit: a Microforest and a First People’s Garden. The project will serve as a living lab, an outdoor learning area, a place for ceremony and elder teachings, and a space for enjoying and appreciating the outdoors. It will enhance biodiversity on our campus and sequester greenhouse gases, in addition to providing other ecosystem services. In this campfire session, members from the project committee will speak about the impactful community-based planning process that was used to engage students and employees at John Abbott, followed by an exploration of accessible tools and techniques which can be used to calculate greenhouse gas reduction and sequestration. This second half would include an explanation of the procedure, followed by an interactive demonstration. We encourage the audience to actively participate in learning how to apply this technique during the presentation, by providing them with the necessary measurements and tools.