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Felix Finkbeiner (*1997), founder of the children and youth initiative Plant-for-the-Planet, developed his vision at the age of 9 during a school presentation on the climate crisis: "Let's plant a million trees in every country on earth!" This later gave rise to the Trillion Tree Campaign with the aim of restoring 1,000 billion trees. To date, more than 100,000 children from 76 countries have joined Felix's idea as climate justice ambassadors. Felix continues to drive the foundation's work with a great deal of energy and has played a key role in expanding the foundation's new technology branch. This is how the internet platform pp.eco was created, which enables donors worldwide to make donations to restoration organizations. Various apps launched by Plant-for-the-Planet support the work of hundreds of restoration projects around the world. By 2023, the foundation has planted more than 12 million trees on the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico. In 2018, Felix was awarded the Federal Cross of Merit by Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and in 2019 he was appointed by Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel as the German government's ambassador for the UN SDG15. In addition to his work for Plant-for-the-Planet, Felix is currently studying for a doctorate in environmental sciences at ETH Zurich.
Daniela Kon Lieberberg is a global media executive, educator and veteran impact producer whose career at the intersection of human rights, community development and non-fiction storytelling spans over two decades. She is the founder and executive director of SIMA Studios, an award-winning global media agency that created a new paradigm for merit, distribution and impact of social issue documentaries. With strategic focus on "responsible impact through creativity", SIMA brings award-winning stories to communities and classrooms in over 100 countries, empowering the next generation of learners and leaders with the global perspectives to create a more equitable and sustainable world.
Hi, my name is Justus, and I am currently in Grade 7. In 4th grade I studied bats for my PYP exhibition project as I used to have a fear of them! Now I am their biggest fan and have constructed and installed the first bat houses at MIS. I have also hosted a Bat Night where we saw that our first bat has moved in ! Also, this year my bat project was one of the two projects which resulted in the school receiving the Eco School Award.
Matovu Nkoba Ismael grew up in rural Uganda, where lack of clean water access was a major challenge. As a student, he initiated a well project providing safe water to 600 households in his rural community. He later founded the tech startup Clawest to leverage AI for increased clean water access worldwide. Through collaborative efforts like the Finley, Nantume, Nkoba (FN&N) Well Project, Nkoba is making a profound impact by empowering rural and marginalized communities with clean water access.
Jennifer Brandsberg-Engelmann has been teaching Economics, Business Management and Environmental Systems and Societies for 26 years in three countries, mainly in the International Baccalaureate. She is an expert in developing and executing educational strategies, projects, processes and curricula. Her core focus is training young people to take action for sustainable and regenerative societies. She has worked with student changemakers in a school Sustainability Action Lab, developing their knowledge, skills and passions through a changemaking curriculum that she lead-developed with colleagues from other disciplines and other international schools. She has co-authored Economics, Business Management and Environmental Systems and Societies textbooks integrating new economic thinking and social enterprise themes into those works. Jennifer has also delivered webinars on sustainability and works to shift curricular systems to new paradigms to address 21st century problems. Most recently, she has been advocating for regenerative economics to replace current economics courses in secondary schools. This changemaking work is ongoing - you may see it in your school soon!
Julie Meltzer, Ph.D., is committed to creating schools that truly help students prepare to successfully meet their futures. She currently serves as the Director of K-12 and Teacher Education for the Institute for Humane Education, a nonprofit organization based in the United States. In that role, Julie leads a team that works with teachers and administrators across the United States and around the world to teach their students how to become changemakers. Julie believes that education is the system that can change all other systems and that redesigning schools to educate a generation of solutionaries is the single best investment we can make for our collective future.
WHAT WE DO :
MAD (Make A Difference) Courses' partners with remarkable communities
and changemakers around the world, giving them a voice and platform to
tell their stories - which in turn inspires and educates students
worldwide. By using interactive video technology, we immerse students
in global issues and innovative solutions. We build curriculum around
the stories we share to prompt greater reflection and empower students
to take informed action.
WHAT WE DO WITH MIS :
MAD collaborates with Kathryn Berkman from Munich International
School, whose students will use the course to develop concepts of
identity, culture, and perspective. She says : "(Before this
opportunity arose) I was teaching systems thinking tools on my own,
without guidance or progression.” Now, she is “most excited” for her
students to be part of a larger community of changemakers, and have
the support of MAD courses as her students develop their projects.
Ivanova is a German climate justice activist, focusing on children's rights violations caused by climate change and resulting social inequalities. As a part of the Children vs Climate crisis petition, alongside Greta Thunberg and 14 others, she petitioned 5 countries to drastically reduce carbon emissions. She also took part in the Fridays for Future school strikes. Ivanova is a former member of UNICEF Germany's Youth Council and having graduated from the IB in 2022, now works as an intern at the International youth NGO called “Heirs to Our Ocean” which brings together youth from differing cultural and socio-economic backgrounds to collaborate towards a just, equitable, and empathetic future.
Climate change is one of the biggest challenges we have ahead of us. There should not be any competition among us as we're all living on the same planet. We know that we need to change our habits, to act differently, to build a different word. To succeed in this journey, we need to engage as many people as possible. The BIG question is how? How do we catch the attention of people, how do we help them to have a better understanding of this extremely complex subject, how do we engage them to adjust their behavior?