Friday, March 30, 2012

Spring of Sustainability

I've been enjoying listening/participating in the Spring of Sustainability program. Organized by The Shift Network and Sustainable World Coalition, this program started on March 26th and goes until June 22nd. This venture includes a season filled with speakers, presenters, panelists and interviews with the leaders in the sustainability movement. It's an opportunity to get a perspective of current and forthcoming trends and innovations related to education, energy, green building, social media and much more. The flexibility of being able to call in or listen and view powerpoints/images online and then have small group break-out sessions is fabulous. This gives participants an opportunity to discuss the points made in the interviews/panels with others from around the world.

These types of programs show the power of leveraging communications technologies and the blend of the traditional phone with the internet to bring people together and share ideas. It's also been interesting to hear about how topics such a climate change are being presented and received by the general public in different parts of the US and abroad.

Having this program extend over three months gives everyone a way of integrating the material and listening to recordings if unable to join in during the live shows. The next step would be to extend this virtual community by having local gatherings and events in the locations where participants are calling from so everyone meets in person.

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