Break The Divide functions around two mediums of knowledge transmission: stories and education.
While these words can sometimes be synonymous, essentially Break The Divide functions through empowering young people to be able to articulate and express their experiences, emotions, and ensuing knowledge from interacting with a world addled by climate change in ways that older adults have not experienced, have yet to experience or have experienced at a smaller scale.
In addition to empowerment, Break The Divide engages in decolonial ideology through the diversification of knowledge sources and forms of knowledge that the organization engages with and uses to inform its programming, its content, and its research. This effectively means that Break The Divide works with youth and elders from different knowledge origins (Native Fijian Elders, Sikh philosophies, Queer economic structures, Indigenous knowledges produced on the land that is currently Canada, etc).
We thus seek to educate the communities of youth that we serve as much as we seek to be educated by them. We actively seek alternative avenues through which we can offer the communities we serve both knowledge and empowerment to continue to act against, resist and build resilience towards climate change, and move towards climate justice.
We currently have three programs working toward our mission.