UCD Volunteers Overseas (UCDVO) will host it’s annual conference “Development Education & Pathways To Change” in the Global Lounge this Friday (December 1st) from 10:00 – 16.30. The conference comes in advance of the United Nations International Volunteer Day on 5th December. The conference will focus on the unique value of Critical Thinking and Development Education at a University level.

The plan for the day includes guest speakers, a story-telling session and three different workshops on Critical Thinking in Education Today, Active Hope and Creative Activism.

The event will also play host to a number of guests including Julia Canney who founded Consent at UCD and Dunnes striker Karen Gueron who famously refused to handle South African produce in protest against apartheid.As a result of public pressure in support of the strikers, in 1987, Ireland became the first Western government to put a
complete ban of South African goods in place. She met Nelson Mandela in 1994 and was invited to attend his funeral in 2014.

Artist and activist Will St. Ledger will also feature.St Ledger has been behind a number of bold installations, such as 100 fake landmines around Dublin’s parks to highlight landmine awareness and placing a life sized fake missile in the city centre for action on Syria. Will as part of the Storytelling panel will share his story and how he decided to
use “his creative superpowers for good”.

The key note speaker on the day will be Professor Vanessa Andreotti who works in the Department for Educational Studies at the University of British Columbia and is a leading thinker on global citizenship education. She has extensive experience working with governments, NGOs, professional associations and local communities in areas of education related to global justice & community engagement.Her work offers insights into how we can start to move together differently towards new forms of relationships and possibilities of co-existence.

If you wish to attend, you must register your interest before midday on Wednesday at the Facebook event page here


Rachel O’Neill – Editor