SoS 2012 will be held on Dja Dja Wurrung Country (Bendigo, Victoria) from Wednesday the 4th to Sunday the 8th of July, at La Trobe University’s Bendigo campus.

Click here to view up-to-date ticket costs or to register for the conference.

Welcoming around five hundred people every year, SoS is aimed at anyone interested in creating a more ecologically & socially sustainable world. You don’t need an invite to participate, just come along! During the week you’ll experience workshops, discussions and forums on a range of topics, demonstrating how theory and practice can be used to make positive social and environmental change. It’s also a great place to meet people, make friends, explore a new town and experience what will definitely be your favourite week of 2012.

SoS is completely organised by volunteers, mostly hailing from the Australian Student Environment Network (ASEN)

To understand further what goes on at SoS have a look at last year’s 2011 Program (click to download), or read more at the History of SoS page.

Participant registrations for the Students of Sustainability (SoS) conference have now official opened! Register now to get Early Bird cheaper prices as the price increases closer to the date (Early bird prices end 1st JUNE).

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER!

We’d love it if you could please register as soon as possible to help us volunteer organisers make sure your food, shelter and workshops/spaces/forums are mind-blowing. Leaving it right till the last minute (tickets are available ‘on the door’) puts heaps of extra pressure on us in planning your fantastic week in Bendigo.

A range of tickets and prices are available, including waged / unwaged tickets, single day tickets, local high school student day passes, and children’s tickets (free for 12 years or under).

Discounts are also available for those from further away states (WA, NT, QLD and TAS). Please email us to get the promo code for the state discount.

Subsidies are available – please email us at info@studentsofsustainability.org to discuss! (Eg/ if you need a bit of a hand with the price, if you’re going to both SoS and the Lizard’s Revenge, if bringing several children, etc.)

All prices are listed if you follow the link below to ‘Continue Booking’.

You can pay by debit/credit card or bank transfer (please email us for instructions regarding bank transfers).

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER!

To learn more about the SoS conference please click here.

Thanks! Love your work.
The SoS Collective
info@studentsofsustainability.org

SoS will be held in Victoria this year on Dja Dja Wurrung country, Bendigo. Yep, that’s right! Right here at La Trobe University Bendigo! It’s a big job and those of us who are working towards it are proud to be a part of bringing SoS to Victoria again, and sharing the stories of this landscape with those that come to SoS this year. Now, while we may be few in number at the moment, we reckon there’s more out there that’ll be keen to be involved and gain some valuable knowledge and skills in organising a big event, and have a heap of fun along the way. So, if you know someone who may be interested in helping, tap them on the shoulder, send them an email or facestalk them, then send them our way!

NEW – bike fixing fun day! Sat 26th May, 10 to 5 in Flora Hill, Bendigo. All welcome! Help get a bike fleet ready for SOS! For more info view the facebook event or email Dan (daniel.abikhair@gmail.com)

**No previous experience or skills necessary, and many roles are able to be done from non-Bendigo areas eg/ Melbourne or Sydney. If interested please contact daniel.abikhair@gmail.com or sosbendigo2012@gmail.com**

Specifically, at the moment we’re looking for:

*Indigenous Liaisons – a couple more people to help Chelsea out making it easy for interested indig mob from around this land to come to SoS, especially in regards to making arrangements for elders to have a comfortable time and journey. Especially wanted if you have knowledge of current indig activist networks, and or have connections.

*Program - a couple more people to come on board and help Maddie put together who’s gonna be speaking, presenting, workshopping, yoga-ing,
knitting and yarning at this years’ SoS.

*Food – If you love to eat, and sharing that love, then the food group would love to have you around. Working out how to feed 400-odd mouths takes a bit of nutting out. Kia and Mezz are ya super-women!

*Finance – Nik ‘Foony’ Foon would love to have someone who knows a bit about finances, accounting and accounting software and the like assist him and keep him on track with all our money stuffs.

*Fundraising + Sponsorship – We’d love a couple of people who could handle a 1/2hr to 1hr a week job just finding out what options for grants, sponsorship and fundraising that exist out there, and letting us know about them. If you could help with the putting together some applications for them too, well, that’d be just too awesome!

*Entertainment - Keen to keep the crew partying? Know a few bands, or some good movies and want to share them? Know how to operate one of them mixing desky things that makes the sound come out all good and stuff? Chelsea would love a helper or two to team up with her and keep the nights going for us at SoS.

*Energy – We all love the idea of a 100% green powered SoS. Got any ideas? Take it on. It’s waiting for ya…

*Promotion – As we move into April and we’ve got some posters and emails and things like that going on spruiking our fine conference of awesomness,
we’ll need some help hitting up the unis, letting the relevant people know, and basically getting the word out there. (If you’re super keen, you can start today by spreading the website: http://studentsofsustainability.org/ or the facebook event: http://www.facebook.com/events/187397901361634/ to all you know, and all that may be interested).

*Bikes – Like gettin’ ya hands greasy and know a spoke from a spokey-doke? We’ve got some fine old machines gathering in sheds around Bendigo, coming up in May – the Super-SoS-Bike-FixIt-Weekend! Come along! More details in late-April.

*Activist Fair – Basically a middle-of-the-day thing on one of the days at SoS, where a bunch of groups can spread their message, info and ideas.
Contacting relevant and interested people/groups and putting it together.

*Collective Care + Grievance - Someone to offer cups of tea and a sympathetic ear when it’s all too much for us! And someone to help us work out an issue between people if it ever comes to that. Touch wood…

Look, if you’re at all keen to help out, come on board! We’d love you to join us on this journey. If you’re interested please flick an email off to daniel.abikhair@gmail.com or to the general SoS email: sosbendigo2012@gmail.com

Please pass this on through your networks and collectives. The more the merrier!

Thanks heaps!

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SoS 2012 stands in solidarity with….

1. The Lizard’s Revenge – Music / Art Festival 14th to 20th July – Roxby Downs, South Australia.

On Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/events/224524544273924/

For more info email – izzybrown@live.com

(Image - Lizard's Revenge Flyer. Click to view larger image)

THE LIZARDS REVENGE
DLF – Desert Liberation Front
Response to the governments decision to expand Olympic Dam mine.

Sleeping underneath the ground there is an old lizard, Kalta the sleepy lizard. The lizard ain’t so sleepy anymore.

BHP is mining right into that Lizards body. The government has just approved an expansion of the Olympic Dam uranium mine, making it the biggest uranium mine in the world.

Kalta is angry and wants revenge. Arabana elder Kevin Buzzacott is calling the people of the world to help the lizard shut down the mine. He is calling for people to come and heal the land in the name of peace and justice for the next 10,000 generations to come.

The land is being irreversibly poisoned in and around Roxby Downs by the tailings dam causing dust and ground water contamination, and contamination of its workers.

The uranium is taken all over the world and used to kill the land and all its creatures. It’s destroying lives not only in Fukashima, with the reactor meltdown, but in the depleted uranium shells that children play with in the streets of Iraq and Kosovo.

With the governments numerous attempts to put a nuclear waste dump at Muckaty in the Northern Territory there is a danger that radioactive waste will be brought back, opening Australia up to accepting nuclear waste from all over the world. Lets stop the deadly cycle where it starts.

The land the lizard and the creatures of this earth are summoning everybody who gives a shit to the gates of Roxby Downs on the 14th of july 2012 for The Lizards Revenge – This is an open invitation to all people and a special call out to artists, musicians and activist community groups and media to get involved in the creation of this autonomous zone for the peace and healing of this land.

Party in a Dangerous Planet with Theatre, Cabaret and Art installations. Over 20 musical acts. Solar Powered sound system extravaganza and wind powered cinema. More to be announced..

2. Road Trip for Change – road trip to both SoS and the Lizard’s Revenge, departing from Adelaide. Multiple travelling options available.

The official website can be found here, and the facebook event here.

Organised by the South Australian Student Environment Network (SASEN).

Email sasen@asen.org.au for more information.

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For more information regarding any content on the website please leave a comment or contact us at info@studentsofsustainability.org and we’ll get back to you.

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We are currently asking for submissions for the SoS 2012 program.

Do you have a workshop you’d like to run?

How about a discussion group?

Is there an autonomous session you’d love to see happening?

Do you have information or ideas you’d like to share with participants?

Anyone can run events at SoS! They just have to based on (a broad definition of) environmental and social justice issues.

Some examples may include: workshops on Tassie forests, a speaker talking about Aboriginal Sovereignty, discussion groups on student activism and the media, a skillshare on hitchhiking, role play workshops on oppression and privilege, puppet shows, discussions on racism and environment movements, sharing ideas about effective protesting, a speaker talking about Israel and Palestine, showing a film on gas fracking, workshops on accessibility, etc.

Please email all program ideas to info@studentsofsustainability.org or leave a comment below!

If you’re interested in running program content at SoS please also consider submitting relevant content or reading material to the SoS reader, which will be distributed electronically before the conference. Click here for more info about the conference reader.

If you need a ride:

Post your name, email, phone number, where you are, whether you want a ride there and back or just one-way and whether you can chip in for petrol costs.

If you can give someone a lift:

Post your name, email, phone number, where you are, whether you can offer a lift there and back or just one-way and whether you require money for petrol.

OR contact people who place ads.  If you would like your ad removed email info@studentsofsustainability.org

Comments are moderated due to spam so don’t be concerned if it takes a while and please get in early to find a ride.

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For more information regarding any content on the website please leave a comment or contact us at info@studentsofsustainability.org and we’ll get back to you.

The majority of donations collected go towards making the conference run more smoothly, prioritizing the ability and comfort of Indigenous elders to come to the conference (whom we are often privileged to have attend), and to helping out people who might not otherwise be able to attend with financial support.

Or,

Would you or your organisation like to become a financial supporter of the student-run conference that is Students of Sustainability? The large majority or what we do is made possible by generous donations by our financial backers. We advertise financial backers’ support on our website and promotional material and are extremely grateful for their help.

To donate to SoS 2012, or to become a supporter, please contact the collective through info@studentsofsustainability.org

Many thanks, the 2012 Students of Sustainability Collective.

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For more information regarding any content on the website please leave a comment or contact us at info@studentsofsustainability.org and we’ll get back to you.

As usual for the Students of Sustainability conference, we’re putting together a reader as a companion to the week. The reader could contain inspiring histories and reflections, mind-blowingly radical ideas, incisive critiques of infuriating injustices etc etc. It’s really up to you!

If you’ve read (or written) something that you would like to see in the SOS 2012 reader, please submit your recommendations to info@studentsofsustainability.org or through a comment on this page as soon as possible, or by the 15th of June 2012 with either a link to the source, or a digital copy.

The reader will focus on themes of Indigenous sovereignty, environmental and social justice issues. Other themes to be advised soon.

The official SoS 2012 poster (click through for a larger size, or email us for the largest a4 version):

Thanks,

the SoS organising collective.

[image= a map of the continent of Australia coloured in with different hues and shapes - showing Aboriginal nations instead of Australian federated states}

The Students of Sustainability (SoS) 2012 collective acknowledge and pay respects to the Indigenous nations and traditional caretakers of this land – past, present and future.

We recognise the sovereignty of every Indigenous nation on this continent – over five hundred nations whose sovereignty was never ceded upon European invasion.

We express solidarity and continued commitment to working with Indigenous peoples both in Australia and around the world in ongoing struggles for sovereignty, land rights, self-determination and the recognition of past and present injustices.

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This website was compiled largely on the land of the Wurundjeri people, with the SoS 2012  conference to occur on Dja Dja Wurrung country.

map reference: David R Horton, creator, ©Aboriginal Studies Press, AIATSIS and Auslig/Sinclair, Knight, Merz, 1996.

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For more information regarding any content on the website please leave a comment or contact us at info@studentsofsustainability.org and we’ll get back to you.