- Are you an international student or a newcomer feeling like you lack the professional experience, skills, accreditation, and climate education to be competitive in the Canadian job market?
Join our free Climate Skills & Community Building Fellowship Program and gain professional certifications from Break The Divide and the Synergia Institute in under 4 months! All program participants will also receive a $50 honorarium upon completing the program in July.
A strong understanding of climate change and climate action is an asset in today’s job market in Canada. Participating in this program will give you professional certificates to authenticate your climate knowledge and skills!
The Climate Skills & Community Building Fellowship, developed in collaboration with the Canadian CED Network and the Synergia Institute, offers international youth in the Greater Toronto Area an unparalleled opportunity. This free program provides comprehensive climate education, professional experience, and climate skills enhancement through professional certification from Break The Divide and the Synergia Institute. With in-person and virtual study sessions, participants get to hone their climate skills, socialize, participate in mentorship and networking opportunities, and develop their climate action initiative that could receive funding from Break The Divide.
The sign-up period for the fellowship program will remain open until June but we recommend that participants sign up for the program by May 6th, 2024 to get the most out of the program.
Program Overview:
In the bustling heart of Toronto lies a unique challenge: how can immigrant and newcomer youth truly connect with their environment and community, especially when the pressing issue of climate change looms large?
As Canada’s demographic landscape shifts, international students and newcomer youth face hurdles in accessing essential resources, including climate education, upon arrival. This disconnect not only impedes their ability to engage with environmental issues but also affects their sense of belonging and empowerment. Taking climate action is often overwhelming in and of itself – but without access to social networks or an understanding of the Canadian context, climate change can feel insurmountable.
The BTD Climate Skills and Community Building Fellowship serves to empower newcomer youth to become agents of change. Through engaging climate education modules, biweekly study circles, and immersive climate emotion circles, participants embark on a transformative journey. Beyond learning about climate change, they find a sense of community—a space where shared experiences and emotions are acknowledged and embraced. This sense of belonging equips them with practical skills to thrive in their new environment and pursue meaningful employment.
Join us in creating a more sustainable and just future where everyone has the tools, emotional resilience, and community to take climate action.
How We Do It:
The Climate Skills and Community Building Fellowship will engage international students and immigrant youth (aged 18 to 30) located in Downtown Toronto in an open online course on climate change and building resilience to take local climate action. The online course focuses on providing newcomers with the necessary knowledge and skills they need to understand and respond to challenges posed by climate change during their time in Canada.
The participants will go through five modules over four months (April – July) exploring different ways in which climate change affects human systems and discovering alternative solutions for the crisis. Every three weeks, the youths will meet for in-person study groups (climate cafés) and discuss the topics they have learned in a given module, as well as share any additional knowledge or experiences. These climate cafés will act as a space for the exploration of thoughts, feelings and experiences on climate change where participants can safely share emotional responses and reactions related to the climate and environmental emergency. There will also be optional online study groups happening every week throughout the course to support the youths in their learning process.
At the end of the program, the participants will have the opportunity to develop and present their climate initiatives/projects. Break The Divide will support participants in developing and launching their climate action projects.
Program Highlights
- Calling for all interested international students & newcomer youth (ages 18 to 30) in Downtown Toronto (and GTA) to learn more about climate and take climate action with us!
- Break The Divide & the Synergia Institute will issue professional certifications to all active participants that they can include in their resume and LinkedIn at the end of the program.
- The online course will explore the theme of alternative systems to create an eco-friendly society and cover:
- Key climate concepts & rationale for change
- Cooperative and community forms of land ownership
- Employment, climate & technology
- Democratic and cooperative financial systems
- How to foster systematic change as individuals and as a collective
- Through our established dialogue framework that encourages young people to share and build an understanding of diverse knowledge perspectives and foster empathy for one another, the program will:
- Nurture a sense of belonging in Canada;
- Build a sense of community through sharing space with youth who hold similar lived experiences;
- Empower participants to address climate-related issues collaboratively.
- Participants will go through 4 modules of learning about climate together with Break The Divide.
- Participants meet every 3 weeks in an in-person study session (climate café) in Toronto to connect, talk about their emotions, and discuss the learned material.
- The program requires a 2-hour per week commitment from our participating youth but provides module summaries and support throughout the program.
- The program equips participants with the necessary knowledge & skills they need to build emotional resilience to respond to challenges posed by the climate crisis, as well as take appropriate climate action in their communities, striving for change.
Our Program Timeline
Our goal with the Climate Skills & Community Building Fellowship program is to equip international youth with useful knowledge and skills necessary to combat the climate crisis in Canada.
- Learning about the key concepts explored in the program.
- Discussing the impacts of climate change on Canada & the world.
- First in-person climate café & online study sessions.
- Examines solutions that involve common, cooperative and community forms of land ownership and how this relates to systemic change.
- In-person climate café 2 & online study sessions.
- Examines precarious employment, the effects of technology and the digital or third industrial revolution on employment, and explores some of the diverse innovations (place-based and digital) being forged to address the growing precariousness of livelihoods.
- In-person climate café 3 & online study sessions.
- Exploring how democratic and cooperative ideas form the basis for financial systems and forms of currency that serve the common good and local economic well-being.
- In-person climate café 4 & online study sessions.
- A glimpse of how all this fits together and an opportunity to contribute to an overall synthesis of how these ideas and practices can generate a transition to a new paradigm.
- Concluding meeting with Break The Divide team & overview of next steps.
- Last in-person climate café.
- Action Projects Presentation: Participants will present a climate initiative they’ve developed during the program, either as a team or individually.
- The Break The Divide team will support all participants in their project development throughout the program.
- One initiative chosen by Break The Divide’s executive team will receive seed funding to assist in launching the project!
- Team Building Trip (more details coming soon).
- Professional certifications from Break The Divide and the Synergia Institute are awarded to participants.
Why You Should Join:
- Professional certification from Break The Divide and the Synergia Institute.
- Skill- and knowledge-building about increasingly relevant topics – become an expert in the emerging climate sphere & broaden your knowledge.
- Community & friendship building – meet new friends with similar experiences!
- Mentorship & networking opportunities with peers and professionals in the climate sphere.
- Improving your resume through Canadian accreditation.
- Lots of fun!
OR…
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, the Climate Skills & Community Building Fellowship is geared towards International Students AND newcomer youth who are not in school. We are excited to have you in our program.
Yes, there are age restrictions. Participants must be between the ages of 18-30 years old as of March 1st, 2023.
Yes! At Break The Divide, we believe that climate action and community building go hand-in-hand. As part of the program, participants will take part in climate cafés where they will have the opportunity to share their experiences with other participants and collaborate on creating a climate action initiative with their peers.
Groups will meet every three weeks in Downtown Toronto to discuss the modules and their experiences with other participants. These climate cafés are a space for the exploration of thoughts, feelings and experiences on climate change where participants can safely share emotional responses and reactions related to the climate and environmental emergency.
Yes, you should! Completion of the modules is not required for participation in the climate cafés, as the participants will discuss things beyond the modules. Moreover, our volunteer dialogue facilitators will distribute a summary of what was covered in the module for anyone who has not had the time to complete it.
At Break The Divide, we believe that the first step towards climate action is building community through conversation and sharing experiences. Everyone has an important perspective to contribute to the climate cafe discussions.
Break The Divide will issue completion certificates/letters of recommendation to all active participants at the end of the program. Furthermore, participants can also request Certificates of Completion from the Synergia Institute if they complete reflection exercises for each of the modules (four in total).
The online course materials will be distributed through the online learning platform Canvas. Once you sign up for the program, Break The Divide will send you the Onboarding Manual, which walks you through the registration steps for the program on Canvas. In case you require any additional technical support, please contact programs@breakthedivide.net (Aria Kani) via email and we will be able to assist you with whatever difficulties you may have.
Keeping up with the materials can be tricky! But Break The Divide is here to help and guide you through the program. Attending the in-person Climate Café is a great way to keep yourself on track and engaged, especially since module summaries will be provided during these in-person sessions. Thus, you will have something to fall back on if you haven’t had the time to engage. There will also be optional online study groups happening every week throughout the course to support you in your learning process.
Through the Climate Café collaborative workshops the participants will have the opportunity to develop and present their climate initiatives/projects. Break The Divide will support participants in developing and launching their climate action projects, as well as providing critical advice and networking opportunities.
You can still complete the online modules and participate in the online study sessions! However, to benefit from the full experience of sharing your experiences and learning from peers to construct climate action initiatives we invite you to attend as much in-person programming as possible!
Break The Divide volunteers will be supporting you in developing your climate action initiative during the collaborative workspaces at Climate Cafés. Furthermore, the Break The Divide team will be available to give you critical feedback and advice on your initiative, as well as guide you with necessary steps that will help you move from an idea to action. Break The Divide will also provide you with networking opportunities for your project to succeed beyond the duration of the program.
Break The Divide volunteers have a wealth of knowledge and experience in climate education and climate action. Participants will have access to the Break The Divide network, as one of the leading climate action non-profits in Canada. Furthermore, Break The Divide hopes to provide useful workshops and community-building trips as a part of its programming, where participants will get to interact and network with leading experts in various fields, as well as different communities. Stay tuned for more details.
Reach Out to Aria to Learn More
Program Manager – Climate Emotions Programprograms@breakthedivide.net(437) 988-6109If you’re interested in learning more about the Climate Skills & Community Building Fellowship, you can book Aria for a virtual chat by clicking this link or email her at programs@breakthedivide.net.