THE first 20 students have graduated from the introductory biodiversity course at Cecas in Leap.
Cecas – the Centre of Excellence for Climate Action and Sustainability – is part of Green Skibbereen CLG, which is a community driven organisation set up to support community awareness and engagement with climate action, biodiversity and sustainability across West Cork and beyond.
Cecas is largely by local volunteers and is run on a non-for-profit basis. Over six evening sessions the group along with tutor and Cecas volunteer Mark Robins covered core concepts around biodiversity, trends and issues and positive examples of nature restoration.
‘What a great group of West Cork people – eager to dive deep into the science and policy backgrounds behind the current biodiversity crisis and then engage with positive solutions to restore nature,’ declared Mark.
The course got a positive reaction. Ginny Humphries from Sheep’s Head was of the graduates.
‘I wasn’t sure about signing up to this course as my background is simply enjoying planting trees and looking after a very small amount of land with wetland and meadow, but I’m glad I did,’ she said.
‘I’ve learnt a lot about different habitats and their species, how they are being lost at an alarming rate but also positive shining examples of what is being done and must be done to address this both locally and globally.’
The Biodiversity School marks the beginning of a further development of the role and focus of Cecas. Next year will see the first Community Climate Action School, starting at the end of January. See www.cecas.ie
