Growing Together - Tracey Notman (Vanier PS) S3E3

In my desk drawer I have a key. It’s a replica antique key. Ornamental, meant to recall a time when things like keys were made not by machines, but crafted by hands; when ergonomics and efficiency were not on the radar, and so beauty and longevity rained; when a pocket was functional, and you were likely to find one weighted down by a key.

The key was a gift. The card that held it said that I was the key - in this case to supporting a project. The thing is: I was not the key. This group of grade 4 and 5 students had taken on an extraordinarily ambitious project: to persuade an audience to fall in love with trees, again. And not just any trees: “We need to plant...” they’ll tell you, “...THE RIGHT TREES.”

You’ll recall the Lorax: “I am the Lorax. I speak for the trees. I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues.”

The Lorax is fiction. Students at Vanier Public School in Brockville, Ontario, are real. And they speak for the trees beyond poetry and rhyme. These 10- and 11-year-olds are empowered agents and citizens of their communities who have something to teach all of us about the power of persuasion. They’ll tell you that when the work feels like it might be done, well that just might be when you have to learn more and work more to bring your vision another small step forward.

They’ll tell you all about biodiversity, the Miyawaki Method of planting “tiny forests”, and the Dish with One Spoon treaty, an Anishinabek and Haudenosaunee teaching that explains that caring for our planet is about caring for ourselves too.

How did these students learn this? By working with the community, in the community, and by bringing the community into their classroom.

And what did they accomplish? In one school year they were able to make recommendations to the school board to diversify a list of approved trees, have two new trees from their recommendations planted in their yard, bring the school together in what promises to be a multi-year initiative to naturalize and diversify their school, all while working towards naturalizing 30% of the property by 2030 in line with the United Nations, and the Government of Canada.

Remember the key. Well, the card went on: “You hold the key to our future!”. Well, I disagree: students of Vanier, and all over this planet, we hold the key to the future, together.

“UNLESS someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not.”

And with your leadership and hard work, I think you might just have the key to unlock our collective efforts to not only save the planet but leave it in better shape than it is right now.

At least, that’s the hope I’m attaching my agency to.