Youth Voice, Climate Action and Sustainable Culture
In May, I helped organise the REACT Sustainable Culture Hackathon at the University of Agder. The event focused on the idea of a possible SDG 18 on Sustainable Culture. Students were asked to consider what such a goal could say, why it might belong in the UN framework, and how it could connect to the existing Sustainable Development Goals. The original concept focused on sustainable communities, democratic institutions and partnerships. In our version, we also included SDG 13 on Climate Action, because climate change affects more than the physical environment: it shapes how people live together, communicate risk, adapt to uncertainty and imagine the future. The hackathon invited students to work with a question that matters deeply in climate debates: if young people are expected to live with the long-term consequences of climate change, how can they also take part in defining what sustainable development should mean?
My role was to help turn this concept into a working student-led event. I contributed to the programme structure, practical coordination, group process and communication with participants. We adapted the original one-day model into two working sessions before the final presentation day. On 18 May, students were introduced to the SDG framework and the idea of sustainable culture. On 25 May, they worked in groups to develop their arguments, prepare slides and rehearse. On 27 May, they presented their proposals.
Building support around the event was also part of the organising work. Pangea Linjeforening agreed to partner in the organisational part of the event, which helped connect the event more closely to the student community. UiA Rector Sunniva Whittaker kindly agreed to sign the certificates of participation, which were awarded to all students who took part. This formal recognition mattered because the students were contributing their own ideas to a wider university conversation on sustainability, climate action and democracy.
What interested me most was watching students move from learning about the SDGs to questioning them. They had to decide what was missing from the existing framework, defend their position and propose concrete sub-targets for a possible new goal. In this sense, the hackathon became a small exercise in democratic practice. Students listened to each other, disagreed, made choices and turned broad concerns about culture and climate into public arguments.
This experience connects closely to my academic interest in youth democratic agency in climate-affected contexts. Young people are often described as vulnerable to climate change, but they are less often treated as knowledge actors who can shape how climate problems are understood. The hackathon showed that students can contribute to sustainability debates when they are trusted with a real question and given enough structure to work independently. They did not simply repeat existing sustainability language. They tested it, challenged it and adapted it to their own understanding of the future.
As organiser, I was reminded that meaningful youth participation does not emerge by itself; it needs to be carefully designed. Students need enough structure and guidance to feel confident, while also having the freedom to develop their own ideas and take ownership of the final argument. This understanding was informed by my earlier experience initiating and designing the EU-funded, student-led FORTHEM short-term mobility programme, “Global Development: Exploring the Gap between Theory and Practice”, as well as by my volunteer involvement in the Youth Democracy event during the 2026 Kristiansand Democracy Week. In both settings, I worked on creating formats that helped students connect academic discussions with real-world development challenges.
The REACT hackathon became a practical experience in designing youth-centred climate learning. It showed how universities can create spaces where students participate in debates about climate action, culture and democracy. I will take this experience forward in my academic work, especially in thinking about how young people can take part more meaningfully in decisions about the futures they are expected to inherit.