Inaugural Junior Jane Goodall Earth Medal at STARMUS VIII

Aneeshwar Kunchala, INTERWOVEN’s 11-year-old Youth Science Communicator, received the Inaugural Junior Jane Goodall Earth Medal at STARMUS VIII, held October 17–22 in Tenerife and La Palma, Spain. He was honored alongside Sir Brian May and Christiana Figueres, recipients of the Inaugural Jane Goodall Earth Medal.

He opened his acceptance with an original poem dedicated to Dr. Goodall. It touched the hearts of everyone in the room, and Artemis astronaut Victor Glover congratulated him from the stage. During the festival, Aneeshwar also spoke to 500 students from Tenerife at the STARMUS science camp.

The new medals place planetary stewardship alongside STARMUS’s longstanding focus on space, marking the tenth anniversary of the Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication. For Aneeshwar, it’s the latest in a list of firsts, from the first Kennedy Center Youth Ambassador to the youngest presenter of a nature television series.

INTERWOVEN co-founders Alicia Adams and Gilda Almeida have supported his journey since presenting his US debut at the Kennedy Center in 2022, and both attended the ceremony.

His work continues this winter in Miami, where a special piece by Aneeshwar appears in INTERWOVEN’s exhibition Youth Stewardship: From Deep Ocean to Deep Space.