IUBS Project: Climate Change Education

The TROP ICSU project has been funded by the International Science  Council (ISC) during the first phase (2017-2019). The accomplishments of TROP ICSU, feedback from various stake-holders and future plans have been featured by ISC in an online article published in February 2020. Representative feedback received from various stake-holders such as participants of educators workshops, undergraduate students, members of partner unions and the motive behind the TROP ICSU project are included in this article. The article can be found here.

The exciting first phase (2017-2019) of the TROP ICSU project ended with the year 2019.  The accomplishments of TROP ICSU project during this phase and future plans are presented in this consolidated report.

The TROP ICSU project was represented at three sessions on climate education at the UN Climate Change Conference COP 25, held in Madrid from 2 December to 13 December 2019 under the Presidency of the Government of Chile and with logistical support from the Government of Spain.

TROP ICSU was invited to participate in 3 sessions on climate education at COP 25: at the IPCC-WMO pavilion, at the EU pavilion, and at the French pavilion.

The third TROP ICSU Working Group Meeting was held at the French Academy of Sciences (Académie des sciences, Institut de France), Paris, France on October 14 and 15, 2019. The meeting was attended by 21 participants, including Working Group members, collaborators, partners, and the Implementation Team members. Over two days, the project and its implementation were presented and reviewed, suggestions for further enhancement were discussed, and possible ideas for the continuation of the project in its next phase beyond December 2019 were discussed.

(Photo: IUBS)

IUBS Climate Change Education Project TROP ICSU  participated at the United Nations High Level Political Forum 2019 (HLPF 2019) on Sustainable Development at the United Nations Headquarters on 11 July 2019 in a three-hour joint session with the International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW) and Harvard University. This session is titled "Practices and Approaches on quality education towards environment and climate action."

The TROP ICSU team facilitated a teachers workshop in Orsay, France on 28 June 2019 in collaboration with Paris-Sud University (Université Paris-Sud). The workshop was attended by 25 teachers.

The TROP ICSU team will conduct three teachers workshop in  Australia in May 2019. The first workshop will be conducted on 24th May with Monash University, the second one on 27 May with University of Melbourne and the third workshop will be conducted on 30th and 31st May with University of Adelaide.

(Image credit: Encyclopedia Britannica)

TROP ICSU was represented in two side events at the Forth Science, Technology and Innovation Forum for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on 14th and 15th may 2019, held at United Nations Headquarters New York.

The TROP ICSU team conducted a teachers workshop in Cairo, Egypt in April 2019. This workshop was conducted in collaboration with our partner Academy of Scientific Research and Technology (ASRT), Egypt.

The TROP ICSU team conducted a teachers workshop in Pretoria, South Africa in April 2019. This workshop was conducted in collaboration with our partner International Science Council – Regional Office for Africa (ISC-ROA).    

The TROP ICSU team conducted a workshop for teachers at Bhutan on 14th-15th February 2019, in collaboration with Center for Disaster Risk Reduction and Community Development Studies (CDRR&CDS), Royal University of Bhutan, Rinchending, Bhutan and Commission on Education and Outreach, IASPEI. Over 60 high school and undergraduate colleges/university teachers from Bhutan participated in this workshop.

The TROP ICSU project was represented at four sessions on climate change education at the 24th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 24) in Katowice, Poland, on 13 and 14 December, 2018.

The first TROP ICSU workshop for teachers was held in collaboration with Sri Venkateswara College (University of Delhi), New Delhi, India, on October 13 and 14, 2018. The objective of the workshop was to introduce the participants to digital teaching resources for teaching topics in the Sciences, Mathematics, Social Sciences, and Humanities using climate-related examples, case studies, and activities.

In addition, participants would be invited to review the educational resources of the TROP ICSU project and to provide their feedback on the appropriateness and ease-of-use of the teaching tools and lesson plans.

80 undergraduate-level teachers participated in the workshop.

The TROP ICSU project (Trans-disciplinary Research Oriented Pedagogy for Improving Climate Studies and Understanding) is conducting a preliminary survey to understand how topics in climate science are currently discussed in the classroom in different parts of the world. It would take approximately 8-10 minutes to complete the short survey available in several languages (English, Catalàn, Chinese, Français, Deutsch, Hindi, Italiano, Japanese, Español).

Please participate in the Survey: