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Four students from Liceo 2 de Florida are working on the project Esmeralda, a place of your peacea proposal that seeks to create a green space within the educational center that will serve as a point of interaction and meeting as a means of contributing to the mental health of those who attend the institution.
In conversation with DailyMaria José Manevisa, the group's teacher, explained that the initiative came from students within the framework of the scientific clubs affiliated with the Ministry of Education and Culture, and that they chose to work on the relationship between natural and mental recreational spaces. health. “The first step was by investigating and watching the information and videos through which we confirmed that there is indeed a relationship and influence of the environment that surrounds us on our psychological health” and on the state of mind that it refers to, for example, and added the neurological architecture.
The students pointed out that there are no green spaces in the high school. On the contrary, the place is “cold and full of cement.” The next step was to put the idea together and conduct a poll to see what the rest of the educational community thought. Finally, they provided students in all afternoon classes with an anonymous questionnaire, which about 80 teens responded to.
“80% of respondents link mental health to the environment” and realize that “the presence of nature is important in building a better environment,” Manevisa said. In the survey responses, which were accessed DailyThe students agreed that the space would allow them to “be quieter” and find themselves, which would work to “free up the screens a little bit,” find peace, and release some emotions, such as stress and anxiety.
The project went ahead because after responses, it became understood that it could have a “positive impact on the secondary school”. After that, a space was chosen within the courtyard of the educational center with a specific area of 4 x 4 meters, and the students of the group implementing the project chose plants, board games, and a wall as basic elements of the space, taking into account the responses to the survey.
The mural will include some student responses, and within the framework of the artistic workshop, ideas will be developed that will be part of the drawing. The design will be decided in the first two weeks of October. We will also endeavor to make the space sustainable in the future, with input from students and high school administrators. The intention is for the work to be “participatory” and installed before the end of the course.
Once the project is installed, the project is considering conducting a new survey to collect the organization's opinion about the idea becoming a reality.
Although club projects do not receive financial support, according to the teacher, what is necessary for the mural can be funded from high school resources. In addition, students receive donations of plants to later sell in recycled pots also made by the students, as well as food, in this way raising money to buy toys, for example.
Manevisa concludes that this type of proposal is not often made because students “don’t know that they are able to do it,” and explains that the spaces they live in can be transformed and that they have the “power” to implement it.
Lessons are thought out within GreencobatorIt is a project promoted by the civil society organization El Abrojo and financed with the contribution of private companies.
