Pillar 2: Civic Engagement - Publications (GOLD)

Overview

There are two pathways to gaining the Civic Engagement Gold badges:

A) The Leverage Pathway

B) The Impact Pathway

 

Option A: The Leverage Pathway

For the Gold level of certificate in Publications, you act as a leverage point in climate change understanding and action. At this level, you are enabling others to engage in systems-level material and empowering them to create their own publications. 

Taking the initiative to set up and manage a Climate Academy project in your school requires a number of skills, and develops significant experience that is recognised in this award. 

If you are a secondary school student, this project will most likely happen inside your school. Climate Academy projects are designed to fit into specific subjects, with a flexible number of lessons to deliver them. Talk with teachers who you think would be open to having their lesson time enriched by the project.

If you are a secondary school teacher, you can either select an “off the shelf” project that fits most closely to your main subject, or you can coordinate with colleagues to do a project outside of your own specialism.

If you are a university student, perhaps you could invest some of your time in a local school near where you study. Or when you are home from university, you could set up a publications project in the Secondary School that you graduated from.

If you are a lifelong learner, then your project could be with a group from your community, work, club, friends of family.

 

Possible publication projects:

There are a number of official Climate Academy projects that you can run with. We are currently constructing the webspace inside which all these official projects will be put. Each project comes with its own set of materials, guidance and supporting documents and videos. 

Here is a snapshot of a few of them.

-         Project #1 “The Writings on the Wall”

Subject: Art lessons

This project pulls together science and art in a funky way. Students get to design and paint a climate change mural. The project teaches both the science of the tipping points that are in play, and also at the injustices embedded in the crisis.

The mural can then be a backdrop to various articles, podcasts or videos about these issues.

-           Project #2 “Movies for Change”.

Subject: Geography / Language lessons

After selecting a chapter of the Climate Academy Student Book to work through, students in a class then identify one key detail or issue to focus on. In pairs, they then design, film and edit a video about that issue.

In this example by Carolina, Jules and Franziska (from Brussels), the focus is intergenerational climate justice.

Thibault Watch

-        Project #3 “Facing the Truth” 

S   Subject: Geography / History lessons

After establishing the macro truths of the environmental tipping points that are in play with the climate crisis, a short case study of Syria will illustrate how the current environmental stress marks are already pushing some societies into a state of conflict.

The work and methods of the journalist/artist George Butler will be explored as an example of the importance of dialogue and resonance. After learning about the science and the human dimensions of the crisis in previous sessions, students sit in pairs, and take time to talk, and draw a portrait of each other. 

 

Create your own

You can also design your own project that is rooted in the systems-level understanding that you developed in Pillar One. If you do this successfully, it might even be eligible for a Systems Entrepreneurship certificate, and your project might be added to our gallery, so that other schools can benefit from your experience and work.  

If you do decide to design your own project, it is critical that the learning remains strongly related to the fundamental frame of all sustainability thinking and action - the planetary boundaries.

 

Option B – The Impact Pathway

If your publication demonstrates outstanding relevance and quality, and is rooted in the systemic level content of the Climate Academy programme, the CUTx Index, and the Greencomp competencies, then you could be eligible for a Gold badge. 

Typically, the quality of your publication would have been recognised in a competition or through media and social media.

Examples: 

Climate Academy students went into a cohort of English language classes and delivered the “Movies for Change” project. They taught about carbon budgets, tipping points, and some of the issues that relate to crossing planetary boundaries.

In one of the classes, 3 Italian students (Mario Massimetti, Pietro Gavinelli & Agnese Battista) made this video. It was eventually submitted to a jury at an Italian Film Festival and won second prize in the short film competition.

“S(no)w” video

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