First Project of The World Heritage Network School's Members: The World Heritage in Ukraine

By Lourdes Ballesteros, co-founder of The World Heritage Network

One of the pillars of the World Heritage Network are schools, and among its objectives are the promotion of peace, respect between peoples and the empowerment of people to defend, through these values, the World Heritage.

In February 2022, the World Heritage Network expressed in a statement its deepest sadness and rejection of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. We called for respect for human rights and people's lives and we also called for ensuring the prevention of damage to the World Heritage in all its forms. But we wanted to go one step further.

We called for respect for human rights and people's lives

Therefore, in the first half of 2022, the Network proposed to the school's members to develop a joint project to work on the World Heritage in Ukraine. We now present the publication that compiles the projects developed by the schools of the World Heritage Network in favor of people and the World Heritage sites in Ukraine.

During the compilation work we felt that in schools, colleges and vocational education and training institutions, the proposed goals were achieved: knowledge, appreciation and dissemination of the World Heritage in danger in Ukraine.

In every project there is a message of PEACE and solidarity for the Ukrainian people

Furthermore, we were touched when we read the works because in all of them there is a clear and powerful message, a message of PEACE and solidarity for the Ukrainian people.

For this reason we would like to thank the Network school's members that participated and promoted a sense of common humanity in their institutions. Let's hope that this senseless war will end soon, so that we can live in a World where the life and treasures of humanity are respected.

Statement for World Peace

The World Heritage Network expresses its deepest sadness and rejection of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

We call for human rights and people's lives to be respected and for any type of attack on children, young people, teachers and professionals in the educational, cultural and business fields to be avoided.

We join the UNESCO statement in which it calls for "respect for international humanitarian law, in particular the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict and its two Protocols (1954 and 1999) to guarantee the prevention of damage to cultural heritage in all its forms”.

We ask that the right to education, peace and solidarity between peoples be defended. Our thoughts are with the people who are closely affected by this conflict. We hope that the feeling of a shared humanity is present in the international leaders who make the decisions.

First webinar of the World Heritage Network

On January 28, the World Heritage Network held its first webinar on the importance of knowing, valuing and preserving the World Heritage.

The co-founders of the Network, Lourdes Ballesteros and Vivian Feher, welcomed the 16 new schools associated in the Network that are located in Spain, Brazil and Ecuador.

The venue for the meeting was at the IES Santa Teresa de Jesús, in the heart of Madrid. In this way, it was celebrated that the capital has been part of the World Heritage list since 2021, when UNESCO gave the rank of exceptional universal value, in the category of Cultural Landscape, to the Paseo del Prado and Buen Retiro, known as Landscape of the light.

The webinar was followed live by students from the IES Santa Teresa and online by students from the other centers belonging to the Network.

The concept of World Heritage is broad and somewhat complex at first. For this reason, the webinar gave an overview on the subject.

After the presentation and to facilitate the work of teachers, an introductory video on World Heritage was sent to schools, as well as a proposal for activities to work on in class.