Egyptian Student Leads Transformation of School for a Greener Future

The Climate Leaders Fellowship spring cycle led passionate high school students in researching waste issues and shaping local solutions. Through impactful donation drives and global collaborations, these young leaders pave the way for a sustainable future.

The fellowship is offered as a collaboration between Stanford University’s Deliberative Democracy Lab and the Rustic Pathways Foundation.

Read about Adam’s project below!

Adam Elbadry
Metropolitan School
New Cairo, Egypt

I am Adam Elbadry, a sophomore at Metropolitan School in Egypt. I have always had a passion for everything that has a motor in it, but this dwindled down when I learned about climate change and how it is harming one of my favorite cities in Egypt, Alexandria. This made me devote a lot of my time and effort to halt climate change.

After attending the 27th United Nations Climate Change conference (COP 27) I thought of ways I can change my everyday ways to be more environmentally friendly, which is why I started with my school where I spent most of my time.

My colleagues who are active with Rustic Pathways and I collaborated and started a Met Green program which was a program to turn our school into a climate-friendly school. Rustic Pathways and all of the facilitators there helped us create this project.

The project me and my partners did was a huge fundraiser that we hosted at our school to raise awareness for climate change. After months of planning it was finally the event day which was extraordinary. My group and I managed it perfectly which was very hard since there were over 100 attendees, but we managed to work everything out.

We raised around $600 which amounts to around 20,000 EGP (Egyptian Pound). The money we raised all went to decreasing the school’s climate footprint like getting LED lights and replacing the plastic cups with paper cups. All of this wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for the cooperation of Rustic Pathways and our school.