Do you care about the environment? If you do come to this year's
Students of Sustainability (SoS) Conference. The venue is confirmed
and registration is now open!!! This year, the fourteenth annual SoS
will be held at Monash (Clayton) University in Melbourne, from the
10th – 15th July. Please read on to find out more. For additional
information including registration forms and promotional material
please go to www.sos2005.org, alternatively email [EMAIL PROTECTED]
For those interested in Fair Trade this will be an oportunity to meet
people from around Australia who are campaigning on Fair Trade issues.
What is SoS?
Students of Sustainability (SoS) is the largest student-run
environment based conference in Australia. Each year SoS offers an
amazing opportunity for students, activists, academics, environment
and Indigenous groups, and members of the wider community from around
Australia to come together to share and gain knowledge, skills and
information on environmental and social justice issues. Featuring a
vast array of inspiring speakers, practical workshops, field trips and
empowering activities, SoS is the most important event of the year for
environment activists and people wishing to learn more about how to
create positive social change in their communities.
The conference began in Canberra in 1991 under the name 'Students,
Science and Sustainability'. This first conference attracted 300
students to discuss matters of sustainability with respect to students
and science. Throughout the past thirteen years, interest and
enthusiasm for the conference has grown, and the number of
participants has steadily and exponentially increased. As SoS moves
around the country, it spreads its unique, life-affirming,
change-making energy to the University and community that hosts it. In
2005 we aim to accommodate over 600 delegates to participate in a week
of forums, workshops, skillshares and fieldtrips exploring
sustainability and environmental justice issues on the individual,
local, national and global level.
The vision is to provide a conference that will bring together diverse
groups of people to share inspiring and thought-provoking experiences,
which encourage positive discussion and action aimed at creating
ecological, political, economic and social sustainability in the
world. SoS provides an opportunity for us to become empowered with the
confidence, practical skills and motivation, required so that humanity
can have a healthy relationship with the earth and all of it diverse
ecosystems.
SoS: An Ethical Conference
SoS aims to create the change we wish to see in the world, even if
just for a week. The conference is designed to foster a sense of
community in the student environment movement. For the week of SoS, we
camp together, cook together, live together, learn together. People of
colour and from Non-English Speaking backgrounds are particularly
encouraged to attend, as are queer people and women. Queer and womens'
spaces will be open every day of the conference, and there will be
sessions focusing on how to overcome homophobia, sexism and racism in
the environment movement. Parents are welcome to bring their children
and childcare arrangements are being made. AUSLAN interpreters are
employed for hearing impaired participants. Registration is cheaper
for delegates from WA, NT, Qld and Tasmania, to attempt to overcome
geographical discrimination and in recognition of the higher travel
costs faced by these participants. The whole conference is planned and
run entirely by volunteers; this is the reason we can make the
conference so affordable and this is why all who come to SoS must be
willing to be a part of the volunteer crew in some way during the
week.
How it Works – Food, Accommodation and Transport
The conference will be catered by student volunteers out of Wholefoods
café, the Monash Student Association food co-operative. The food is
vegan (animal product free), locally sourced and organic (synthetic
fertilizer and pesticide free), with limited packaging to minimize
environmental impact. The conference program is printed on 100%
recycled paper using soy-based inks. Recycling and composting
facilities are used at the conference.
SoS is a camping conference; most participants will be camping on the
University oval and using University toilet and shower facilities.
Yes, it is Melbourne and yes it is winter; so bring at least two
sleeping bags and a sleeping mat each, and plenty of jumpers and thick
socks. Billeting is available for delegates who are unable to camp due
to special circumstances.
Transport to SoS will be organised collectively from most states by
the state student environment networks. Contact your state environment
convenor for information about collective transport to this years'
conference. The state networks are also in charge of fundraising to
subsidise delegates from their states to travel to the conference.
Indigenous Participation
SoS 2005 is being held on Bunnerong land, part of the Kulin nations.
In the past few years SoS has become an important event in the
struggle for indigenous justice, with elders from many Aboriginal
nations attending. This year we are trying to increase the number of
young indigenous people attending the conference and are making
registration free for all indigenous delegates. There will be an
autonomous indigenous space where forums, workshops and activities
will be held throughout the week. ???The Monday of the conference will
focus specifically on indigenous history and current struggles.???
Program
This year's SoS will be a mix of open-space workshop programming and
pre-organised forums. In order to get the most out of SoS and make the
week useful in solving the challenges faced by the student environment
movement and our network, the Australian Student Environment Network
(ASEN). As such, there are several 'strategic question' themes running
through the week, expressed each day through a different theme.
The conference will be structured around several 'strategic questions'
as themes:
– The alternatives: "One no, many yes'" – what futures can we create?
– Activism, lifestyles and education: How can we make a difference here
and now?
– Our movement: How can we as a movement survive, campaign and build
strategically?
There will be workshops and forums on Fair Trade, Climate Change,
consumerism etc.
Registration – earlybird rego closes 10th June.
In this year's registration pack you will find a registration form and
workshop form to photocopy, an SoS flyer and poster to advertise the
conference on your campus and in your community, as well as
instructions on how to fundraise for and travel to SoS. We have also
included an inspirational piece about SoS, what it is and what it has
the potential to be. Please register on line at www.sos2005.org,
contact your campus or state contact point (see end) or send
registrations forms to:
SoS 2005
Student's Association
University of Technology, Sydney
PO Box 123
Broadway, NSW, 2007
Cost
Delegates from NSW, ACT, VIC and SA
Early Bird Registration (must be paid in full by Friday 10/06/05)
Full conference Concession/Unwaged $115
Full conference Waged $150
General Registration
Full conference Concession/Unwaged $145
Full conference Waged $175
3 Day pass Concession/Unwaged $80
3 Day pass Waged $110
1 Day Concession/Unwaged $40
1 Day Waged $60
Delegates from QLD, NT, Tassie and WA
Early Bird Registration (must be paid in full by Friday 10/06/05)
Full conference Concession/Unwaged $90
Full conference Waged $120
General Registration
Full conference Concession/Unwaged $115
Full conference Waged $145
3 Day pass Concession/Unwaged $60
3 Day pass Waged $90
Indigenous Delegate Registration
The registration fee is waived for Indigenous delegates
As you can see we have tried to keep registration as cheap as
possible, to make the conference accessible to everyone. Registration
this year includes optional membership of the Australian Student
Environment Network (ASEN), our national network. It is really
important that students choose this registration option, because as
you will be aware, we are facing the imminent threat of the
government's 'Voluntary Student Unionism' (VSU) attack, which will
decimate campus, state, and national student unions, including the
environment departments within them. A lot of work has been done on
building ASEN since the meetings at last year's SoS, and we are ready
to make sure student environment organising continues on a national
scale post-VSU, as long as we have your participation (and membership
fees!).
In enviro-techie news, ASEN now has two websites up and running - a
public site at www.asen.org.au and an internal organising site at
www.asen.prevolution.edu.au. And of course there is the SoS site,
www.sos2005.org.
Well, feel free to call us on 0410 375 755 or email
[EMAIL PROTECTED] to chat about SoS, ASEN, the climate and VSU
campaigns, or anything else, and hopefully the organising collective
will receive rego forms from your campus/ group on or before 10th
June.
See you at SoS!!
The SoS Organising Collective 2005
Contacts:
ASEN Convenor/ NUS National Environment Officer – Anna Rose, ph: 0410 375 755
NSW SEAN Convenor – Wenny Theresia, ph: 0402 564 862
Registration (National) – Nicky Ison, ph: 0423 717 567
On-site (Monash) Contact – Mel Szydzic – 0412 145 003
Indigenous Liason – Danya Bryx 0421 931 065
Important: registration is being done through the state networks, so
for information on state-centralised registration and transport call
the contact listed below from your state (see next page – how to get
to SoS 2005), if you are doing this DO NOT REGISTER ON LINE!
State Registration and Transport Contacts
NSW/ACT -, Richard Parkin, 0421 255 179, [EMAIL PROTECTED],
Naomi Blackburn, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Nicky Ison, [EMAIL PROTECTED], 0423 717 567
If you no longer want to be on this mailing list, please send an email to
[EMAIL PROTECTED] with
unsubscribe food-co-op
in the body text.
If it does not work please email me with your email address in the body text
at [EMAIL PROTECTED]
regards :)
