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Description
Legionowo (Mazowieckie Voivodeship), like many cities in Poland, has an increasingly aging population. As a result, actions taken by the growing seniors’ population are of increasing importance. The youth, on the other hand, are often only spending nights in Legionów, while engaging in actions and initiatives in Warsaw and are not involved in our town for a number of reasons. We know from research that many citizens of Legionów would like to engage in pro-environmental activism, but they don’t know how to get involved. Our project is designed to encourage young people to get involved in civic initiatives, including our town, by providing them with concrete tools and knowledge on how to get involved in local actions. We will also activate the seniors to take on actions to counteract the climate change. We will create Legionowo Eco-Center. It will be a space for education, where the initiatives related to environmental protections can be implemented. We will also conduct eco-workshops for 40 individuals – seniors and young people between 13 and 18 years old. The workshops are meant to increase the awareness about the necessity of acting to mitigate the climate change. During the meetings the participants will design eco solutions for Legionowo and later implement them.
Summary of project results
Legionowo (Mazowieckie province) is an ageing town, just like many locations in Poland, which is why the importance of activities taken up by seniors (or their negligence) is increasing. At the same time, youths living in Legionowo often come back here only for the night, engaging in activities and initiatives in Warsaw, and because of various reasons they choose not to do it locally. Furthermore, numerous studies indicate that many Legionowo inhabitants from various age groups would like to engage in environmental activities, but they do not know how to do it.Hence, in our project we decided to encourage young people to involve in social campaigns in our town, providing them with specific tools and knowledge on how to engage in local activities. We also activated seniors to join initiatives for the climate. We established EkoCentrum in Legionowo. It is an educational venue running initiatives related to environmental protection, such as eco workshops for seniors and youths aged 13-18, increasing the awareness of pro-climate initiatives. Their participants came up with 22 sustainable solutions that could be carried out in Legionowo. Eight of them were selected and implemented, e.g., a climate protection quiz, ''Our Wardrobe'' - a small cottage at which residents can leave items they no longer use and exchange them for something they need, and a clothing swap. We also organised a debate joined by town representatives to present the outcomes of our project.During the project we noticed that significant environmentally-friendly changes took place among participants, for instance, by the end of it nearly all of them started using reusable instead of disposable water bottles, they also started paying more attention to their own behaviours and started changing them to more sustainable alternatives. Cooperation between youths and seniors also led to numerous positive effects, since both groups could share knowledge with one another, e.g., on more efficient mobile phone use or on cooking.
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