Caymanian environmental activist Dejea Lyons is among 35 young people from around the region participating in the newly launched Caribbean Climate Justice Leaders Academy education programme aimed at building knowledge on issues impacting the Caribbean.
Lyons told the Cayman Compass that being chosen for the Climate Justice Academy cohort has been “such an honour”.
“The selection committee sifted through hundreds of applicants and narrowed it down to 35 Caribbean youth… The programme has been running for a couple of weeks now and I have already learnt so much. We have sessions every week that include the entire cohort, our lead facilitator Stacey Alvarez and a couple of guest presenters. Everyone is learning from each other,” she said.
Island Innovation, in a press release issued on the programme, said the first group of participants, all of whom were selected following a strict application process, come from every CARICOM country, as well as other territories across the region.
The cohort of ‘climate justice leaders’ are undergoing a 10-week programme, that began the end of July, aimed at “equipping passionate individuals with the knowledge, skills, and networks necessary to tackle climate change head-on and advocate for climate justice”, Island Innovation said in the release.
‘Informative and positive space’
Lyons, reflecting in the programme which she is participating in virtually from London, where she is attending university, said it has been “an amazing informative and positive space” for youth leaders of the region to share their experiences and receive mentorship and guidance from professionals in the field.
Stacey Alvarez de La Campa, programme manager at Island Innovation, said, “It was incredible to experience the motivation, commitment, and diversity of the young people who were selected to be part of this inaugural cohort. Collectively, they represent a sense of purpose that is rooted in a wisdom far beyond their years”.
She said despite their youth, the participants possess levels of expertise in relation to community action and climate-smart projects.
Those projects, she said, “are a testimony to the participants’ resourcefulness, resilience, and understanding of the crucial role payed by facilitating meaningful, grassroots-level community empowerment”.
Lyons said at the end of the programme she will have the opportunity to attend COP26 either virtually or in person to share a plan of action that she is going to make after participating in all of the teaching sessions.
“This would be a plan of action that I would bring to our community in the Cayman Islands and the Caribbean region as a whole to tackle an issue that I am passionate about,” she said.
The cost of attending COP28 in Dubai will be covered for five participants, while the remainder of the cohort will take part in Island Innovation’s annual COP virtual pavilion, which covers the two-week event and the latest developments related to islands.
Climate injustice
Lyons said the first three weeks were about understanding climate justice since it is a very new topic that many are unfamiliar with, and included a deeper dive into how climate science works.
“Our last session has been about advocacy and community engagement and the connectedness between those two ideas. Furthermore, I have been working on my first assignment that is about the cohort creatively expressing their experiences with climate injustices,” she added.
Lyons said she was grateful to Island Innovation for giving her this opportunity to be a part of the academy.
“I am so thrilled to continue the academy for the next couple of weeks and then eventually share my project with the community soon,” she added.
The programme is funded by the Open Society Foundations, the world’s largest private funder of independent groups working for justice, democratic governance, and human rights.
Lyons said the most interesting thing that she has leant is that climate injustice is not just affecting individual groups in Cayman, but the island and the Caribbean as a whole.
“Due to other countries’ irresponsibility and actions in terms of handling their contributions to climate change, us as small island nations are bearing the brunt of extreme climate change events such as the high temperatures we have experienced over the past couple of weeks. I did not realise that this was considered as climate injustice, but now since the academy, it is something that I am hyper aware about,” she said.
Climate injustice is everywhere, she said, adding that she hopes to make the public more aware of that when she completes the academy programme.
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