What matters to you?
That’s the question the Rethink Thinking Summit at Royal Bay Secondary school sought to answer over the weekend.
Roughly 200 students from around the province, including those on the West Shore, took part in the second annual event in which students brainstormed topics that were of interest to them.
Under the guidance of Jeff Hokpins, principal of the Pacific School of Innovation and Inquiry on Douglas Street, students then broke into groups of various sizes and flushed out the ideas, determining the problem and coming up with a solution.
Topics included sustainable housing, creating a space for students to share their art, saving bees, sex education, encouraging the regrowth of the coral reef, stopping the use of animals for entertainment, and using recyclable materials to make instruments, among others.
“What’s important to you? What is it that drives you to get out of bed in the morning and really do something with your life? [Students] haven’t been asked that question before,” said Rebecca Kirstein, co-founder of Rethink Thinking.
“We should be asking that question sooner and be asking that question all the time in school – What matters to you and how do you explore that and make that real and connect with other people who care about what you care about.”
Students were also able to have a 15-minute conversation with experts from a human library, which included Olympic athletes, business and marketing advisors, musicians, artists and those who have started non-profit organizations, to help them along with their topics.
Guest speakers included mental health speaker Kevin Breel, whose TED Talk Confessions of a Depressed Comic went viral within days of release, and the Earth Group, which works in conjunction with the World Food Programme to feed, provide water and educate children around the world.
Kirstein hopes the summit ignited a passion in students.
“The main goal that we want kids to take away is that this weekend they get that spark. They have that little flicker of ‘oh wait a minute, there’s more to this and there’s something in me that has value and other people see it and I can use that to make change in the world and develop meaning in my own life,’” Kirstein said. “Once you feel that spark, you seek it out.”
While the summit has come to a close, students who want to further their topic have the opportunity to do so through the Blue Paper Project mentorship program, which connects them to community partners and potential funding sources to help make their ideas a reality.
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kendra.wong@goldstream