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 How old/young are you?
I was born in May 1991, therefore I am 21.
Where do you live?
I live at the Baltic Sea, in a small German town called Greifswald. But I was born and raised in Frankfurt (Main).
What do you do (studies, work, etc)?
I study a bachelor of science program called Landscape Ecology & Nature Conservation.
It is based on bio- and geosciences, supplemented by the fields of law, economics, ethics and land use to focus on environmental challenges of today and tomorrow.
So we learn a lot in theory AND practice: the complexity of ecosystems, the potential of landscapes, the tools needed to save them, how to create a sustainable usability etc.
A lot of work but I totally love it!
In my leisure time I usually do various kinds of sports, meet friends, do voluntary work, enjoy doing nothing at all with a good book or music, travel around and much more.
Which YEE Member Organization are you a member of? What are your organization's main activities?
I am a member of FÖJ-AKTIV e.V.
It is an organization that develops the ecological voluntary service FÖJ in Germany for young people up to the age of 27. We also support the agencies of the FÖJ and all the volunteers by informal or sometimes financial aid.
This way our work is focused on the protection of environment, climate and nature with help of different projects where we train multipliers. Most of the projects directly are ideas of the volunteers.
Really special for this organization is the fact that every project and work is done by volunteers with, if needed, the help of our board.
Why did you want to become a member of the YEE board?
Some time ago I had a position similar to this one. Not taking over responsibility and not making things work felt wrong and made me miss that kind of job.
Anyway, I thought it was a great chance and opportunity to work with such an amazing international team. There is so much to learn and so much to achieve if we join our forces and work together.
Besides I wanted to share my knowledge and skills, develop them further and also contribute to protection of nature through YEE as a multiplier.
What is your main aim as 2012-2013 Board Member?
To make YEE a stronger network by pushing it to an even higher level and make it also be seen and heard on the political stage. I also want to lower YEEs impact on nature, for instance by encouraging member organisations to do more local projects or those where no long travel is needed.
Which environmental problem worries you the most?
What worries me the most? It is not a single one of those many, many problems. It is how people think and act. The lack of environmental awareness.
Thanks to science we know what is going to happen. We have plenty of knowledge about what we should and could do to prevent or at least delay huge environmental problems which, one day, will concern every single person living on this planet.
But still people don't get the point. Still they think about their own comfort first (and that their life standard is normal or even too low). Still economy goes first. Still people fight nature conservation. And still you have to defend yourself when telling you try to live as ecological as possible or you work as an ecologist. And, how sad is that, the list goes on.
People refuse to think about how they affect nature. Many times they do not even get the idea of doing so. Being a vegetarian brands you as a weird person. At school ecology often is, if mentioned at all, just a small and boring point. Children are not taught so many important things they should know.
To cut a long story short: What worries me the most is that the majority of our modern societies have lost any connection to nature, do not respect it, see nature and it's resources as given and never-ending and tell science to shut up.
What is your favorite place in nature?
I love forests and small clean streams, mountains as well as the sea. I don't really have a favourite.
But in nature I am like a child so I enjoy especially places off the beaten track, places where I can discover nature in its huge variety and where I can play around a little bit.
Did you ever jump on a quaking bog? Certainly not the safest thing to do, but extremely fascinating and just awesome!
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