Millennium Kids
History
Millennium Kids was founded by four twelve-year-olds in 1996.A small group of Western Australian students attended the United Nations ‘Leave It To Us’ environmental conference for children in the United Kingdom. Upon their return, they were disappointed with the level of youth involvement in local environment issues and decided to develop their own environmental conference, "Kids Helping Kids", with support of Perth Zoo, Department of Environment, Clean Up Australia, CALM and the City of South Perth. Following this, they founded Millennium Kids.
In 2000, they presented a series of "environmental challenges" to Environment Minister Cheryl Edwardes, who tabled them at Parliament.
In 2012, the Western Australia Headquarters was based in the Old Fremantle Prison. The group works with schools to arrange environmental and sustainability education, connecting pupils and teachers with local community groups.
In 2014, the group organised projects to clean up the Swan River.
Organisation
Millennium Kids is a registered charity with affiliates in Canada and South Africa, and has collaborative links in Indonesia, China and Malaysia. The organization is run by children aged 10-25 years old and is supported by educators, mentors, and sponsors. In 2014 the president was Rachael Cochrain.Millennium Kids is directed by a Youth Board, with fifteen members aged between 10 and 25 years. It is supported by the United Nations Environment Program Agenda 21, Chapter 25 Declaration which states that "national governments should pay more attention to the opinions and concerns of children regarding the environment’ and how it should be managed for future generations".