On Tuesday, all TerreWEB students went on a field trip to
visit different organization and have a look at their work in general and the
communication aspect of their work. It was a very interesting day and it was
very refreshing to get out of the academic world and see what else we could do
with our degrees.
First we visited an NGO called Forest Ethics in Downtown
Vancouver. They are advocating for usually forest related environmental issues.
They try to get things changed by approaching especially large-scale consumers.
One tool they use are public campaigns, including posters, adds in newspapers
and demonstrations, in case companies are not willing to talk to them. Very
interesting was that they try to always stay on the legal side and to not hurt
the companies too much, since they still want to be able to work together. Apparently
persistence is one of the most important advises they had. Social media and
newspapers are for sure important tools they use but apparently the most
important way of communication is still the phone. Thanks to Valerie Langer from Forest Ethics for this
very interesting overview!
Afterwards we jumped on the bus heading south to Surrey,
where the people of the Ministry of Environment (MoE) were already waiting for
us. I was very impressed by how many employees they had mobilized to present us
what they are doing. They have a lot of different projects and services going
on. However, we could also see that in some cases protection of environment is
not always defined the same way. Employees of the MoE communicate with a very
diverse group of people, ranging from the Minister and other government
members, over companies and farmers to the general public. Communicating with
the media seems to be more restricted, however a new approach is to use social
media and to improve the website. You can for example follow Sheldon Reddkopp
(water quality) on twitter (@sheldonatwork).
Thanks to all of the MoE people for introducing us to their
work environment and showing us a cubical ;)!
And thanks to TerreWEB for organizing this great field trip!
