Students Hear from Environmental Activists at UN World Oceans Day Event

Students from schools across Hong Kong participated in the annual virtual, UN World Oceans Day Event, on 8 June 2021. This summit was led by Kenneth Kwok, Founder of NGO Kids4SDGs, and co-hosted by Global Goals Council, DITO (Drop In The Ocean), and the Hong Kong Green School Alliance.

Representatives from Island School heard from Bodhi Patil, from Parley & Oceans Uprise a youth community, who discussed the important role coral species plays in maintaining the ocean ecosystem and how we as humans depend on it to provide fresh air.

Bodhil explains how our oceans are in danger

Dana Winograd from Plastic Free Seas, Jennifer Wang from EcoDrive, Kamakshi from Youth Ocean Alliance and Alexander Zhang from DITO shared with students their expertise and experience on the topic of ocean sustainability. Students also participated in the interactive discussion as well as the Q&A session at the event.

Sam Hui (11W), WANBO leader, said, “We are very grateful to hear from all these inspiring, highly engaging speakers who informed us of the alarming circumstances that our oceans are in. The meeting was mind-opening and an excellent opportunity for us to engage in discussions about environmental issues that we care about. We all learnt a lot and we are looking forward to participating in similar sessions in the future.”

The students who took part:
Grace Zheng (12F), Sean Lee (11N), Sam Hui (11W), Samrin Monami (11D), Hannah Wu (10D), Ginny Park (10W)

As we move forward, we are looking to recruit new student volunteers to help out in WANBO. If you would like to volunteer, please contact Mr. Ross Burrough (ross.burrough@online.island.edu.hk). Space on the teams are limited, so early sign up is advised.

For more regular updates and announcements on the project, as well as opportunities for students to get involved in our initiatives, please go to WANBO’s Instagram page @iswanbo.