UPDATE!!
We have created an online community for SOS-2010 collaboration and discussion. It is

All are welcome to come down, share your thoughts and contribute to forums and discussions. Also, if you want to help organise the 2010 conference join the working groups :)

History

Students of Sustainability (SoS) is a five day camping conference for
anyone interested in creating a more ecologically and socially
sustainable world.

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 17 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... 

Each year students, community members, Indigenous
activists, academics, public intellectuals, environmental educators and
social change agents of all stripes and from all over Australia are
invited to participate.

There is a range of educational, practical and
participatory forums, workshops, excursions, entertainment and lots of
time drinking chai with new friends.

Opportunities

Feedback from SoS participants year after year
testifies to enlightening, empowering and even frequent life-changing
experiences.

SoS 2009 was no exception, and SoS 10 is aiming to continue the
tradition. The conference will provide inspiration through personal
connection with active and effective social change-makers and with the
broader grass-roots movement. The conference will offer access to many
future opportunities in study, volunteer involvement and contacts for
career pathways.

Access to and involvement with national and
regional campaigns and networks of activists will be promoted and
encouraged throughout the conference, providing opportunities for
continued involvement.

Specific knowledge, skills, contacts and networks
derived through the week will empower in a variety of ways unique to
the particular individual. Skills workshops, including campaign
strategy, lobbying, organising, facilitation, political and recycled
art, gardening, home-made clothes and DIY renewable energy will empower
participants in a diversity of practical skills. Empowerment through
knowledge will also be a key focus with popular education
(participatory) techniques to be encouraged throughout the conference
(see program for more details).

Hope

The experience of the conference itself - popular
education methods, open space workshops, participants' agreements, and
a consciously and deliberately sustainable, creative and friendly
atmosphere - will provide hope for a better world, belief in its'
possibility and tangible avenues to pursue it.

Vision

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.

We can all be Students of Sustainability!

SoS 2010

In 2010 SoS will be held in Adelaide - stayed tuned for more info.