Welcome! This mentorship programme is a partnership between Friends of the Earth and the Richard Sandbrook Trust. Part of our work at Friends of the Earth is about championing and empowering the voices of the next generation. Richard was one of the founders of Friends of the Earth and was deeply invested in young people’s leadership.
The Richard Sandbrook mentoring programme has two key aims:
- To help create climate justice leaders of the future
- To amplify the voices of young people who are marginalised in the climate justice movement
Who do we mentor?
Our participants come from diverse backgrounds, including:
- working class
- racialised people
- and/or disabled young people
We want to develop the skills and interests of passionate, young people and watch them become climate justice activists who are ready to change our world for the better.
What is climate justice?
Climate justice is about acknowledging and addressing that some people are hit by the climate crisis harder than others. We’re all entitled to live in a world where we’re fairly protected and considered when faced with the worst impacts of climate change, irrespective of who we are and where we live.
How do we create future climate justice leaders?
Our programme aims to help our participants run their own campaigns for systemic change.
We pair up our participants with experienced campaigner mentors – who come from similar backgrounds – to help steer their campaigns to success.
Our programme also organises skill-up sessions every fortnight to allow our participants to share their stories for change.
What is our programme philosophy?
Our programme philosophy builds on ideas of:
- intersectionality – understanding race, class, gender, and other individual characteristics “intersect” with each other.
- collective care – caring for each others wellbeing and emotional health. Seeing it as a communal responsibility, not something you have to do alone.
- international solidarity – showing you stand by and support interests, purposes and actions of the international community and stand by their needs and rights to achieve goals.
Our programme material, campaigns, and the stories we tell actively challenge norms of injustice. We centre the voices of marginalised individuals and communities in the UK and beyond.
Some of our amazing young campaigners
Rowha Mohid, 26, London
Rowha is campaigning to build a community response to support mental health. Rowha’s interested in how we can use design to power our activism while working together to create resilient campaigners. She is involved in several projects which she founded, check them out: @GuiltlessThreads, @SeedEd.Projects, @YourOwnSkin and Rowha’s personal profile: @RowhM_
Ifeoma Ekemezie, 23, London
Ifeoma is passionate about raising awareness of environmental racism and opening the discussion about equal representation in the green sector.
Aliyah Green, 24, London
Aliyah wants to develop a campaign that empowers young people to create systemic change. Her goal is to tackle systemic issues in our society, and fight for environmental justice.
Becca Cole, 19, Hampshire
Samuel Owusu Appiah, 21, London
Samuel is interested in campaigning to raise awareness of the health risks that come with climate breakdown. Samuel is particularly interested in bringing a greater awareness on the effect air pollution has on the black community.
Noama Chaudhry, 21, Gloucestershire
Noama is interested in the power of community. Noama is working on creating eco-conscious initiatives that benefit her community such as setting up clothes swaps.
Some of our fab mentors
Karen Larbi
Karen is a social change trainer, facilitator, writer, event producer, peer counsellor, advocate and writer. She is the Founder of POC in Nature Nature and is a member of RSPB’s England Advisory Committee. She previously worked at Campaign Bootcamp, NUS and on the Time to Change campaign against mental health stigma and discrimination, and is the Co-Founder of Black Woman Heal United Kingdom. Find out more about Karen and her work.
Kennedy Walker
Kennedy is a coach, facilitator, trainer, and researcher whose journey into social and economic justice organising started with grassroots campaigning in London almost ten years ago. He has since campaigned on a breadth of issues including trade justice, community land ownership, migration, climate, and in 2017, he co-founded activist and organiser network, KIN. Follow him on socials @kennedysrwalker
Grace Jeremy
Grace’s campaign focus is climate justice. Grace is particularly interested in the intersection of disability with other marginalised. A bulk Grace’s time is currently spent in education for change as opposed to direct activism. Grace helps develop the campaign skills of communities tackling injustice, and also trains up other social change trainers/facilitators to help create sustainable activism education.
Lyndsay Burtonshaw
Lyndsay is an activist and changemaker. Lyndsay has been involved in the anti-deportation movement, including blocking a deportation flight from Stansted airport, and joining #ShutItDown Yarls Wood protests. Lyndsay’s main craft is as an activist-facilitator, including with the BeautifulTrouble, Navigate coop, Quaker Peace and Social Witness, and Active Hope networks. Check out Lyndsay’s crew Queer Tours of London.
Natalie Doig
Natalie campaigns for disability rights. Some of Natalie’s work includes co-ordinating the Mayor of London's first disability arts and rights festival in 2003, being Head of Services and Transport at the Disability Rights Commission and volunteering with Bedfordshire Rail Access Network. Natalie runs her own business providing advice, training and campaigns support for multiple organisations, as well as leading on local and national social change campaigns.
Zara Todd
Zara is a disability rights activist interested in how we can make change through policy and training. Follow Zara on Twitter to find out more about her campaign work.
Rebecca (Becki) Wilson
Becki has been an organiser for over a decade, starting off as a trade union shop steward. She has worked on campaigns and programmes around workers’ rights, women’s rights, fracking and air pollution. She is currently a Senior Organiser for the New Economics Foundation, where she leads a programme organising communities across the UK to campaign for more social housing
Harpreet Kaur
Harpreet Kaur Paul is a human rights lawyer, researcher and writer. She recently co-founded Tipping Point UK, and is a PhD candidate at the University of Warwick’s Law School.
Siana Bangura
Siana Bangura is a writer, producer and community organiser from South East London, now living and working between London and the West Midlands.
Across her vast portfolio of work, Siana’s mission is to help move marginalised voices from the margins, to the centre.
Find out more by visiting Siana's website, Twitter or Linktree.
Sharon Anyiam
Sharon Anyiam is a Lecturer in Health and Wellbeing in Society and Global Health. She is currently completing her PhD in Sociology, investigating the most recent wave of Black activism through an exploration of Black millennial narratives on criminalisation and resistance. Her research interests focus on race, racism and resistance in its intersections. As a former project officer for The Racial Justice Network, Sharon has widespread experience in anti-racist community organising at grassroots level, taking part in community-led campaigns at local, regional, national and international level.