Soil Symposium

This year sees the launch of a new project designed to address climate anxiety in young people, helping them understand the causes and effects of global heating and what actions we can take to lessen and adapt to climate impacts.

During the spring and summer, we will be working with groups of young people from across the UK to co-create a range of future visioning activities. Including both facilitated workshops and self-led experiences, these will be designed to help people to explore positive futures and how we can make change happen. Once developed and tested they will be rolled out to visiting school, college and university groups, with self-led activities available to visitors to CAT.

A 2021 survey of 10,000 young people in 10 countries found that nearly 60% felt ‘very worried’ or ‘extremely worried’ about climate change, with 45% saying that these feelings impacted their daily lives. Future visioning can improve understanding of both the problem and the solutions, and help young people to see where they might influence change.

This project is funded through the ‘Bold Futures’ programme from the Association of Science and Discovery Centres, Museums Association and The

Liminal Space design consultants, and is supported by Wellcome as part of the Inspiring Science Fund.

Our Graduate School Open Days are the perfect opportunity to find out if studying at CAT is right for you.

Attending an on-site open day will give you a taster of our courses and studying at CAT through an introduction and course overview presentations, tours, Q&As and course taster sessions. Meet programme leaders, support staff and CAT students and graduates during the day and find out more about studying with us.

Or join staff from the Graduate School on one of our virtual open days to find out more about studying on one of our postgraduate courses. Sessions last roughly an hour and a half and include an introduction to CAT and our courses and give you the chance to ask any questions you might have about studying with us.

Visit our website at cat.org.uk/opendays to see upcoming open days and events, or sign up for news by email. Whether you choose to visit us in person or virtually from wherever you are in the world, we can’t wait to meet you!

We urgently need to change how we think about and use the soil to ensure our food security and fight climate change.

As part of the Tyfu Dyfi project (see page 10), our Soil Symposium will be bringing together a range of experts and community composters to share their knowledge, skills and experience on protecting and restoring our soils. We’ll cover everything from microbes and fungi to creating the ideal blend of compost tea. There will be talks, tours, hands-on workshops, creative explorations and round-table discussions, all aimed at building our understanding and inspiring action.

• Soil specialist Richard Hartnup (see page 12) and other experts in soil, food and growing will join us to explore the the world beneath our feet.

• There will be a chance to meet some of the people involved in the Tyfu Dyfi community growing project.

• We’ll showcase some of our students’ work on soils.

Join us at CAT on 13 and 14 May to dig deep into soil.

Soil is one of our most precious non-renewable resources. While the dirt beneath our feet often gets taken for granted, it is home to thousands of animals, plants and other important organisms, and sustains all life on Earth. However, today, a third of the world’s soil is moderately to highly degraded.

• CAT’s gardeners will be on-hand to give advice.

• And if you’d like to bring the family, there will be activities for children too.

So, roll up your sleeves and keep an eye on our enews and social media for updates when booking opens.